


Seven Stupid Teenagers Inherit the Universe

by SilverAmoebasquid



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: College AU, Gen, Yas, also i was trying out new styles of writing for practice, and this was the best way to do it., another college au, big ol' next gen platonic cuddle pile is what i need okay, day1: meeting/bonding, day2: friendships/relationships, day3: future, day4: pranks/games, day5:angst, day6: sleepover, day7: free, gdi present tense is a bitch idk if ill ever be able to write actual decent present tense lmao, hq-next gen, i know im so original, like first person. and fucking present tense, next gen captains, next gen captains fanweek, so here. have this gift. its a monstrosity, this is a 7 chapter fic (corresponding to each day this week) so buckle in kids, yes - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-13
Updated: 2018-08-06
Packaged: 2019-06-22 19:49:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 30,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15589428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverAmoebasquid/pseuds/SilverAmoebasquid
Summary: All planning on attending the same university, the next gen captains decide to make their living situation easy by arranging to live together in a rented house. After all, they already know each other a bit and what's more fun than sharing a house with all your former rivals from high school?





	1. Welcome to the Chaos Emporium

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written by Akaashi Keiji

There are three things you need to know before I start this story. First, my name is Akaashi Keiji. Second, I’m about to start my freshman year of college as a music performance major at a big university. I’ve been playing piano and violin since I could walk and music is one of few things that ever clicked for me. Volleyball comes close, but it’s more of a hobby than a way of life for me. Lastly and most importantly, I have no idea what atrocity I committed in a past life to get where I am now, but it can’t have been anything short of first-degree murder. Karma’s a bitch. I’m just disappointed it had to kick in now, in this incarnation, when I feel like life is otherwise all laid out in front of me like a posh dinner. All I have to do is take what I want from each plate passed around to me and find myself happy and full at the end of the night. But somehow a small dog got into the dining room and is sitting under my chair trying to bite my leg. That’s what it feels like anyway.

Basically, I have this vision for the future, graduating high school and going to college to be a great musician and _then_ the excitement picks up. But right now, it looks like I found some excitement to tide me over until then. A dog trying to bite my leg off while I attempt to quietly eat dinner, if you will.

Somehow in the middle of my plan to lie low, I ended up smashed in the back seat of the car of someone I barely know, who is evidently one of my new housemates, Futakuchi Kenji. Next to him in the passenger seat is Terushima Yuuji, someone I know even less about aside from the fact that both are very loud and I don’t think I trust Kenji driving with Yuuji trying to use the radio to summon extraterrestrials and Kenji looking for the knob to extend the car’s antenna. Wait, was that—? Nope, we didn’t need to stop at that stop sign anyway. It’s just there for decoration.

We’re on our way to dinner at the current moment, but I’ve been getting texts from Kenma for the last half hour, asking why we’re so late. The answers ride next to me in the form of two massive potted plants. Yuuji and Kenji saw a home store on the way to the restaurant and _had_ to stop and buy plants for the house. I didn’t try to argue though I doubt it would’ve worked anyway. But I am starting to wish I had ridden in the other car.

The other four of my new housemates are already at the restaurant we decided on since they didn’t need to go on any unplanned plant quests. Ennoshita Chikara, maybe the one person in this group who I actually trust with a car is driving and he had already claimed Kozume Kenma, my closest friend from high school, as his navigator. Kenji, the owner of the only other car in our possession, had claimed Yuuji for his own, to no one’s disagreement. The other two, Shirabu Kenjirou and Yahaba Shigeru loudly protested riding with them and flung themselves into Chikara’s car. Five people would be a little cramped but in hindsight, that probably would’ve still been the better option and I could be ordering food right now instead of holding two potted plants upright while Kenji takes a turn way too fast.

Divine intervention gets us to the restaurant in one piece and I find Kenma graciously saving the seat next to him for me.

Kenjirou and Shigeru have taken to complete opposite corners of the table from each other, shooting glares that imply I should be grateful I wasn’t riding with them. Given their skills at loudly arguing against riding with Yuuji and Kenji, I’m not surprised they found a way to loudly argue with each other. Chikara has a content smile on his face, but his eye is also twitching. So.

After complaining to Kenji about making everyone wait, Shigeru sips his water and waves the waiter back over to order. I like having plenty of time to look at the menu, but impatience was already a rising tide at the large table and I wasn’t about to make everyone wait longer so I order the same thing as Kenma.

From directly across the table, Yuuji nudges me and leaned close, eyes wide. “Keiji, what do you think of the name Natsuki?”

I have no idea what he means by this but he’s looking at me like a little kid in a candy store, excitedly tapping his fingers on the edge of the table so I have to answer. But is this something to take seriously or assume as a joke? “I think it’s a fine name... Why do you ask?”

“We have to name the houseplants! Come on, Keiji, we just adopted two beautiful children into our family and you forget that we have to name them?”

Ah, yes. Of course. How silly of me to forget about the naming ritual for my new plant kids.

Yuuji reaches across the table, poking my hand, curled around my own water glass. “You have to have a say in the decision because you’re just as much a parent to them as me and Kenji. We got them together as a team, right?”

A strange thing happened: I suddenly didn’t regret riding in the Chaosmobile anymore. Yes, it meant getting thrown around and witnessing minor traffic infractions as well as deafening pop music pumping from the speakers, but it apparently meant I was a part of something now. I don’t know any of these people who are to be my housemates aside from Kenma and Chikara but it seemed at least Yuuji was more than willing to warm up to me. Implying that I was as much a part of the decor escapade as him and Kenji was a sweet gesture.

I also hadn’t expected such a genuine thought from Yuuji as to give a plant a respectable name, but it seemed he might be more than I can see at face value.

I sat up a little straighter in my chair, hoping to convey that I was listening and invested as common courtesy would see me do. “I think Natsuki is a very pretty name, perfect for a nice plant like the ones we picked out. Did you pick that name for any certain reason?”

Yuuji grinned like he was a little kid in a candy store who had been told he could have _anything_ he wanted. “Natsuki is the name of my favorite character from a game called Doki Doki Literature Club!”

Well, I could still pretend the plant had a respectable name for a respectable reason. “Oh. That’s very nice of you to honor her by naming your plant after her.”

If Yuuji didn’t stop violently nodding, he was going to fall out of his chair in seconds. “Yeah! I had to honor her! Because she’s dead! Everyone dies! Sort of?” He looked confused for a moment before Kenji jabs a finger into his shoulder. “Mine’s better. You’re still an idiot.”

Yuuji frowns. “The art of not being an idiot is very difficult for me.” He jabs a finger right back into Kenji’s shoulder. “Kenji wants to name the other one Led Zeppelin after his favorite band. Are you okay with that too?”

Of course. Natsuki and Led Zeppelin, a match made in heaven. Kenji looks at me like he’s daring me to argue so he can have a reason to win a fight. I think I’ll be careful around him when he has this look on his face. “Yeah, that’s fine. I feel like we missed an opportunity though, given Led Zeppelin’s lead singer’s name is Robert _Plant_.”

The challenging expression on Kenji’s face turns to pure elation and he nearly overturns the table as he jumps to his feet, hand raised for a high-five. “Bro! You know Led Zeppelin too?”

I smile cautiously, withdrawing my hand, now stinging after the over-enthusiastic high five. “I’m a musician. I don’t know everything but the classics are important.”

Yuuji butts back in. “But Keiji, you don’t know Doki Doki! That’s just as important! When we get home we’ll start a new game and you can play it with me!”

 _When we get home_. I guess it is home for now, the house the seven of us are renting for the school year and possibly longer. It doesn’t feel like home yet as most of my possessions are still boxed up, sitting in the corner of the bedroom, but getting to know a bit about some of my new housemates is making it feel a little closer to something that might be called a home one day.

 

The food is brought out minutes later and we all tuck in. The table is much quieter now as everyone eats. We all moved in yesterday and today and we waited until everyone was somewhat settled before leaving so the evening outside is growing dark and we’re all starving, not bothering to breathe, much less speak between bites of food.

The exception to the rule is Kenji and Shigeru who are finding things to complain about, like the texture of the napkins and the temperature of their water. At least they seem to be on the same team in their whining, having bonded over being petty. It seemed to be working out well for them until they decided to be petty about _me_.

I don’t try to eat particularly fast, but I’m almost always the first to finish any shared meal and I’ve never quite been sure why. Going out to eat with friends, I’ve become accustomed to sitting quietly and waiting for everyone else to finish but that was clearly not the case here. Some time in the middle of the meal, Shigeru and Kenji turn their attention on me and my nearly-finished plate of food, dropping their conversation to cram their own food into their mouths at top speed.

Shigeru gave up first when a bit of sauce dripped down his chin and he looked horrified at himself but Kenji kept on going, finishing before me with plenty of time to spare because... it’s not like I was trying to race him or anything...

With Kenji done eating, the table got louder again, laughter and conversation echoing between everyone.

Yuuji attempted something theatrical in the aisle next to our table but Kenjirou hissed and pulled him back down before he could embarrass all of us in one fell swoop. Amidst it all, I had half a notion to feel grateful for the group of people I’d ended up with. No one here seemed to be too similar which, while it had the potential for some conflict — such as Chikara currently laughing hysterically as Kenji held his stomach, doubtlessly feeling the effects of eating dinner like a vacuum cleaner while Kenji swore at him loud enough to earn our table nasty looks from around the dining room — we might actually be a nice mix of personalities. If we could learn to respect each other's differences, we could keep each other in check and balance each other out.

The plan for the night had been to hang around at the restaurant and talk about life and school and get to know each other better before heading back home, but when the waiter handed us our checks and not-so-subtly told us we were disturbing the other patrons I quickly stood up to leave. There was no chance certain members of our group would be interested in quieting down, no matter how many complaints we got. Mercifully, Chikara, Shigeru, and Kenjirou stood up with me, agreeing with my plan to answer our ultimatum before any consequences were attached to it.

Breezing through the front doors, the cool evening air feels relaxing and warm compared to the carefully regulated air conditioning inside. As soon as the doors shut, Kenjirou loudly declares that he would not be riding with Shigeru again on the way home.

“We don’t have room in our car though,” Yuuji said, turning to face Kenjirou while skipping backwards into the parking lot, miraculously without tripping.

Kenjirou narrows his eyes. “How? Kenji’s car is the same size as Chikara’s.”

“The back seat is a little messy,” I supplied quickly, falling into step beside Kenjirou. “I’ll swap you places though if you really don’t want to sit next to Shigeru.”

The former setter for his own team, Kenjirou had always seemed to be a pretty level-headed person and one of the members of the party I was looking forward to getting to know the most. After evidently being included in Kenji and Yuuji’s friendship circle after the plant adventure, I didn’t dread the car ride home, but I wouldn’t mind being in the presumably quieter vehicle. Kenjirou looked like he was weighing his options as well. He eyed Kenji and Yuuji, then Shigeru. “What’s the mess in the back seat...?”

“Potted plants,” I answer.

Kenjirou nods. “Thank you for switching with me. Shigeru and I have a bit of a history anyway. We’ll get past it eventually but evidently, today is not that day.”

I smirk. At least he’s honest about it and I certainly didn’t have any complaints about switching cars. I split off with Chikara, Kenma, and Shigeru and climbed into the back seat. Chikara’s car smelled much nicer and the seats weren’t covered with soil, which was a nice change from the ride to the restaurant. The music was quieter as well and the company was much milder.

Chikara starts singing along to the radio and I hum until Shigeru punches my shoulder roughly, his eyes smoldering. “You can probably let go of any dignity you have left right now. Just sing if you want to.”

Unlike Kenjirou, I do not have a “history” with Shigeru, but I could kinda see how he might be easy to get into a conflict with. I start singing quietly but I’m not sure if I was singing because I wanted to or if I feared the consequence of silence.

When Shigeru starts singing too, I relax a bit, but it’s a unique feeling. As a musician, I can sing and I’ve been told I’m good at it beyond what the fundamentals would have me perfect, but I’m not used to singing in front of people. I’ve never sat in a car with friends with the radio playing and all of us singing along. It seemed like a very college thing to do though, and I think I enjoyed it, watching streetlamps fly by out my window and making note of neon signs in the darkness for stores and food places to check out later.

Kenma is still characteristically quiet in the front seat, playing on his phone. I’m not sure why or when, but I reached around him and took it. He didn’t say anything, just sat back and looked out the windshield. For some reason, that makes me happy with the lights from outside blurring past, the car full of singing growing to an obnoxious dynamic and my best friend enjoying the view instead of absorbed in a game.

 

It seemed like the ride had ended too soon when we pulled into the driveway. I squint at the building, trying the word “home” on for size again. Considering the personalities around me, I thought it might be attainable.

When the seven of us were volleyball team captains in high school, we kept in contact, mostly for the sake of sharing information and organizing practice matches, but I suppose in a group like this, it’s impossible for some friendships not to grow. Talk of college started during the second half of the school year and it happened that we were all planning to attend the same university. It seemed like an unlikely coincidence to me, but the campus was big and it offered a lot of courses of study. It was a common choice. So instead of being skeptical of the chances, I decided to embrace the scenario for what it was since it answered the question of where I would be living.

Looking back, it might not have actually been the wisest choice I ever made. A quieter match probably could’ve been found, but there was little to do about it now other than invest in noise-canceling headphones.

On the plus side, joining with the other captains had cleared away the quest for housing immediately, a relief I was grateful for. The house we rented is owned by Kenjirou’s parents who have several properties in the area that they rent to students and it’s less than a mile from the school. With the seven of us living there together, monthly rent is quite manageable. There are only five bedrooms, but I’m fine sharing one of the larger rooms with Kenma. He and I had talked about rooming together anyway in the school’s dorms before the house offer had landed on the table so we didn’t mind the arrangements. A house is preferable to dorms and I like the thought of living with people I at least sort-of know.

Kenji’s car pulls in right after Chikara’s and we all pile out. It’s pretty clear from the screaming that Kenjirou probably regretted swapping positions with me. I decide not to say anything to him about it, lest he decides it's somehow my fault.

Stepping back through the front door, I remember why our original plan had us spending the evening at the restaurant. With seven of us moving in at once, the house is a wreck, boxes everywhere and everyone’s belongings somewhat mixed up.

I tap Chikara’s shoulder as he inspects the living room and pushes a laundry basket full of clothing off one of the couches. “What about the back patio?”

His face lights up with a gentle smile. “I forgot about that. Good idea, Keiji!”

It took longer than it should’ve to get seven people back outside, but we all ended up in the back hard in one piece, shuffling around to sit down on the concrete patio, still barren of furniture, but still more usable than the living room. It’s also much more peaceful in the darkness, lit by the single bulb overhead where moths fluttered around, only to be disappointed and fly away again.

When everyone settled, it was silent for maybe the first time all day.

Chikara speaks first, a bashful smile on his lips as his eyes dart around the circle. “This is way too formal, guys. We’re just supposed to be talking about school or anything else now that we’re all living together. Kenjirou, maybe you want to start since this is your house?”

“The house doesn’t belong to me any more than the rest of you.” Kenjirou shrugs. He has soil in his hair and smudged across his cheek. It looked like he had at least tried to wipe it off but hadn’t had much success. This would probably be the last time he’d agree to ride around with Kenji and Yuuji. “But if this house burns to the ground, I won’t hesitate to tell my dad who it was. So watch your back.”

Shigeru raises his hand lazily. “Aren’t you a communications major, Kenjirou?”

“Communications and marketing. Double major.” Kenjirou narrowed his eyes. “Why?”

“Because for a communications student, I’m sure you could’ve found a better way to say that without sounding like you expect one of us to burn the house down.”

“Bold of you to assume I don’t expect one of you to burn the house down.” Kenjirou shrugs again. “Anyway, don’t expect to see me around here much. I’m taking 18 credits of classes this semester, I start a job tomorrow and I’ll be tutoring for the math classes I tested out of on Thursday nights. If any of you need math help, I can do it.” The confident expression on his face is impressive, if a little haughty, but he probably deserves the attitude if he’s taking on so much of a load without looking stressed. I don’t think I’d have the energy to keep up with a double major as well as a job and tutoring but based on the limited contact I’d had with Kenjirou through our group chat from last year, he seems plenty capable.

Kenji rolls his eyes. “Are you _that kid_ who always gives really good presentations and makes everyone else not want to go next because they know they’ll look bad coming right after you?”

Kenjirou glares. “Everyone else should’ve just worked harder so their presentations are presentable. Why, are you intimidated to share what your plan for the year is after hearing mine?”

“Pfft, no. It’s hard to be intimidated by someone with dirt on their face.” Kenji high-fives Yuuji.

Kenjirou’s expression contorts back into anger and he rubs at his cheek some more. "Not to be dramatic, but I almost _died_."

I’m not sure I want to know what the car ride home had looked like in the other vehicle. Kenji waves to get the group’s attention on him. “I’m an engineering major anyway so I feel like that’s impressive enough to hold its own. I’m leaving a lot of options open so I may end up with a job if I feel like it, but given that this is the prime of my life, I’d rather enjoy myself if I can while I’m here.”

I glance over at Kenma beside me. I’m decent at math, but don’t know all the ways it applied to real life. “Is an engineering degree kind of like what you’re doing?”

He shrugs and looks up, finding all the eyes in the circle on him now. He’d recaptured his phone at some point, but he put it down to speak. “It’s not really the same... I’m going into software engineering but that’s more programming and writing code than building things. I used to want to go into video game design but that’s a hard job to find so I think I’ll probably end up doing something else. But as long as it’s computers, I’m happy.”

It’s nice to hear Kenma comment on his own happiness and I find myself smiling. It’s rare for him to show a preference for one option or the other, usually following someone trusted around as opposed to making his own way but ever since the end of the school year, he’s been more assertive with doing things his way.

“I’m majoring in having a good time!” Yuuji waves his arm high above his head. “But actually I’m going for psychology! Which is fancy speak for a degree in having a good time! I have a full-ride and I want us to get a dog and maybe a motorcycle so we can go joyriding and I want a boyfriend please if that’s possible and if any of you guys are interested, you know where I live” — Yuuji winked — “and if you’re not interested, uh, you should come with me to the gym someday  because I can bench, like, a lot and it’s pretty impressive and you might rethink that whole not being interested in me. Uh, and I’m really excited to live with friends because this already feels like the perfect college vibe and I think we’re going to have a great time! So yeah, that’s all of my plans for this year!”

Yuuji has a full-ride? I don’t know a lot about him personally but his attitude wouldn’t suggest a scholar. But really, his personality doesn’t have to imply anything. I don’t know if general classes will pose a problem but it is reassuring to know there are some smart people living here that I can ask for help if necessary. Although, I don’t know yet if anyone here is _actually_ as good as they say they are.

Shigeru clears his throat. “I’m here on scholarship as well, but mine is for volleyball.” He looks around the circle. I don’t think anyone else is continuing to play and Shigeru looks pretty proud of that fact. “I’m an undeclared major right now but I have some plans. I’m just waiting to see what looks the most promising, though I may end up getting scouted for the national team or something, you never know.” His eyes seem to be focused on Kenjirou, but I can’t help feeling just a little jealous myself. I had fully considered playing volleyball beyond high school but hadn’t felt the desire to. Shigeru’s effort to look impressive had worked though. Coming from a high school like Aoba Jousai, there’s no doubt he is skilled.

Chikara snickers. “It’s not nearly as impressive, but I think I’m going to sign up to play on the intermural volleyball team. There isn’t the same glory but I just feel like I’m going to have a hard time leaving the sport behind.” Now that’s a sentiment I share. “Kenma said he would think about joining with me, but I’ll extend the offer to any of the rest of you as well. If you guys were thinking of trying out, you wouldn’t be alone out there. I’m a film major and I’ll just warn you all in advance, I might ask some of you from time to time for some help acting if that’s alright. You definitely don’t need to be a professional but I think it’s going to be a lot of fun. And as a bonus, when I’m a famous movie director someday, you can brag about how you knew me in college and acted in my school films.”

Yuuji loudly proclaims that he wants to be in every film Chikara directs, then all eyes fall on me. I realize I’m the last to speak up about my plans.

“I’m... a musical performance major. I can play pretty much any family of instrument out there but I usually stick to piano and violin. I think my dream is to tour with a symphony orchestra but probably not for a while until I get better.”

“Do you own a violin?” Yuuji asks loudly.

I nodded.

He beams. “Will you show it to me sometime?”

“Sure.”

“Will you play it for me sometime?”

“Maybe,” I look between the other members of the group. “I’m going to do all my practicing on campus. I wouldn’t want to bother anyone who’s studying or sleeping or anything.” That seems to be a good enough answer for Yuuji and the others.

The moon has risen since we stepped outside. The backyard isn’t anything fancy but it’s nice to have the space and the well-kept wood fence around the property. Conversation devolves back into random topics that bounce between everyone. Despite all our different interests and personalities, it isn’t long before we all relax and talk like today isn’t the first day some of us have ever met in person. At one point, I’d thought I’d spend most of the time relying on Kenma and Chikara for company since they were the only ones I knew I got along with but as the night deepens, I find that it isn’t hard to feel like a part of the family. It might take a few conversations like this before it’s totally comfortable to talk to the others, but this is a good start for sure and it feels like the best possible start to the school year, even if it isn’t the calm, private life I had been expecting.

I stop trying to hide laughter at one point during the night, probably around the time Yuuji and Kenji start telling the story of when they had ridden a stolen shopping cart into a lake together last year.

I’m still chuckling to myself through more outrageous stories from all members of the group when Kenma rests his head on my shoulder. I couldn’t help feeling halfway surprised. Usually, he probably would’ve just excused himself and gone inside if he was tired but it was possible he actually wanted to be out here.

From my other side, Chikara puts his head down on my opposite shoulder and smiles. “Hi.”

“Hello.” I smile back. “If you’re both tired, you can go inside. I’m going to turn in soon too, I think.”

Chikara sighs. “Yeah... In a minute. I’m happy here.”

“Me too,” I said and it’s definitely a true statement.

Yuuji sees us and grins, and I know the moment of peace is over. He leaps forward to join the cuddling, prompting Kenma to stand up immediately, like he’d been anticipating an attack from the start.

Still feeling at ease with the world, I stand up too and the others quickly follow suit. It’s past midnight and no one had realized how tired they were, myself included, until we stepped back through the back door into the tornado wreckage that is our half-unpacked house.

It’s far too late to do anything about the mess until morning so with sleepy “goodnight”s we separate into our rooms.

In the room Kenma and I share, there’s barely a clear spot on the floor. The only chore we bothered doing earlier was making up our beds before heading to dinner with the others. I’m glad we had at least done that much and made it easy to get ready for bed quickly and flop down.

Lying low through college might not be an option anymore, I muse, but if that’s on account of the fact I have six friends living with me to make sure each day was eventful, I’m okay with that.


	2. Saving the World by Feeling a lot of Things™

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -Teru :D

We’re two weeks into classes and already all my plans are coming to perfect fruition. With sunlight streaming through my window announcing the start of another new splendiferous morning, I stretch and run my fingers over the sheets. Memories of last night are foggy and I forget which of my alluring housemates is curled up next to me tonight — JUST KIDDING ITS NONE OF THEM (yet).

I stretch out across my bed and sit up, wishing the curtains a good morning as I throw them open.

From across the room, my roommate stirs and groans from his own bed. “Yuuji? It’s too damn early for that thing outside.”

“What thing?” I smirk. “You mean the sun? Because that’s always going to be there for you in the morning, sorry to say.”

“Yeah, the sun. Put it back. I’m not interested.”

“Kenjiii~” I whine, jumping on his bed. “It’s a brand new day! You should get up and enjoy the morning with me!” Kenji is Best Roommate Status but he would also sleep like all day if you let him

“Or you could enjoy the morning with me my way.” Kenji pulls the blanket back over his head so I flop down next to him, throwing an arm over his chest. Perks of rooming with your best friend. Cuddle puddle before class.

Kenji snickers and plays with my hair the way he knows I like. “You know that fanfiction trope where best friends promise that if they’re both single in ten years, they’ll just date each other? We should do something like that.”

“Why not just date right now?” I laugh. “I’d settle for a punk like you.”

“Because who would I practice kissing with? You landed me my first date of high school and I’m not about to lose my wingman. Half the people we live with are the ‘playing hard to get at’ type but it’s just a matter of time.”

When I shift slightly, the sunlight from the window shines directly in my eye. Just like that, everything changes. Call me a superhero or a god, the term doesn’t matter, but I get my powers from the sun. Half-blind, I sit up and smile down at Kenji. “New idea! What if we fulfill that _other_ fanfiction trope where we pretend to date each other and see what kind of jealously we can evoke from the others! Maybe one of them will reveal their true desires! It’s like being a wingman but, like, I get to cuddle with you also.”

Kenji snickers and blinks. His breath still stinks but he looks much more awake now which is good. If we’re going to land new boyfriends, we both need to be at the top of our game. “We need to be real subtle about pretending to date each other so no one suspects anything. If it looks like we’re trying too hard, they’ll catch onto what we’re trying to pull. Do we know how to do subtle? What does subtle look like.”

I shrug. “I’ve never done subtle before. Maybe if we were subtle, it would actually make people more suspicious than if we just do our thing. Would we make some sort of announcement if this was real? I feel like we would.”

“Yeah... The biggest, loudest announcement possible. That seems like canon FutaTeru. Got anything in mind?”

My fake boyfriend knows me altogether too well. “I can hit the high notes of Panic! At The Disco’s ‘Death of a Bachelor.’ ”

 

In less than five seconds flat, Kenji and I begin our first nationwide live duet performance in the kitchen and I think we did a great job of serenading everyone in the house at once. Kenjirou stalked off back to his room after the first chorus. Shigeru glared and made more coffee. Kenma didn’t look up from his breakfast at all. Keiji looked like he was just critiquing our musicality (I thought we sounded pretty good together). Chikara smiled and applauded when we had finished.

 

With that, Kenji and I release each other and start making breakfast for ourselves, careful to stay very close together so our _extremely subtle hint_ will be received that we are definitively, for sure _A Thing™_.

When Kenjirou stalks back out of his room to leave as quickly as possible, I decide he’s the best candidate for a survey of how Kenji and I are doing so far.

“Hey!” I dash after him, kicking his shoes away from him so he can’t escape so easily. “Kenjirou, good morning!”

“What the fuck are you doing?” He fights me for his shoes.

“You didn’t like me and Kenji singing together?”

“It was not what I had pictured my morning sounding like. Yuuji, I have to go. I have an early class today and I think you do too.” He snatches his shoes and turns his back on me.

One hand already outstretched, I end up touching his back as he turned and I didn’t pull away too quickly. “Well, I’m trying to gauge how well we did. Did you just not like the song or did you not like, you know, me and Kenji being together. We’re dating now.”

“Good for you.” Kenjirou elbows me aside. “I didn’t care for either option.”

He touched me! I’m in heaven mixed with a strange hell all my own! As the door slams with Kenjirou’s exit, I look back into the kitchen where Kenji winks at me for doing a good job. There’s no way this plan will fail at this rate! Day one and I already have Kenjirou head over heels for me!

The rest of the morning seems to go swimmingly as well and I even made it on time to class despite leaving the house five minutes before 8 after a super quick casual make-out session with Kenji in front of the others, making several of them groan. All part of the plan! Man, do they all wish they were us!

 

The house is always quieter in the evenings since Shigeru is always at volleyball practice, Kenjirou is always at work, and the others have a smattering of activities of their own some nights. I realize how hungry I’m getting a little after 6 so I wander around the house, looking for a potential victim or friend to waste the night with, watching TV and eating microwave dinners. The only one home is Kenma, trapped inside his room, probably intending to stay there all night. Only a fool would assume a peaceful night alone would be possible ha HA! Not that Kenma is a fool. He’s fantastic and very funny when he tries. But just unwise to expect solitude when he lives with ME.

I knock on his door and poke my head in, showing a winning smile. “Hiya! I’m thinking of making dinner and watching TV or playing a game or something. Care to join me? Hint: I’m going to keep pestering you until you say yes and eventually you’re going to realize it’s not worth it anymore so you might as well just accept your fate.”

Kenma slowly swivels his chair away from his desk to look at me and he remains emotionless for a moment. “Why?”

“Because I don’t want you to be lonely in here all night!” I laugh and hold out a hand. “You’re my friend and I don’t want to be lonely either and the Xbox is finally properly hooked up and I’m craving nachos that I would totally share with you.”

With a soft sigh, Kenma stands up, though he doesn’t take the hand I’m offering before we head back out into the living room where he sets up the game and I make nachos as promised.

For the first half hour of playing, he’s silent and denies my attempts at conversation while I yell at the game that he’s unsurprisingly good at. In an act of practiced precision, I reach into our shared nacho bowl at the same time as him while he’s absorbed in a mini-quest and our hands brush. Trope achieved. Frick, I’m great at this. Why don’t I have 47 boyfriends already?

Kenma looks at me and I wink. He sighs and pauses the game. “You’re not actually dating Kenji, are you. I figured you might be trying to make someone jealous but I didn’t think it would be me.”

Gold. Brilliant. Superstar. Genius. Uber boyfriend material right here. I figure there’s no reason to make up a lie since Kenma clearly knows exactly what I’m up to so I just grin. “I mean, ideally, it’s everyone but you are definitely included in that. Kenji and I are just trying to have a good time but if we can land boyfriends in the process, then it’s all the better! Are you in the market for someone to cuddle per chance?”

“Possibly,” Kenma says as he takes another nacho and looks back at the TV, fingers moving deftly over the controller like he could play this in his sleep.

Through the back window, the sunset shines in and blinds me again with another idea as brilliant as the warm rays. I give Kenma my full attention, scooting closer. “Oh yeah? You got someone in your scope? Because like I said, Kenji and I are just having fun. If you’ve got your eye on someone, we’ll leave you alone... unless you want some advice. Or if you want to practice kissing.”

“I’ll pass. No offense.”

I hadn’t planned on taking it offensively until he suggested I might be offended by it. But really, who _wouldn’t_ want to practice kissing with me. I’m the best out there. Instead, I grin and push his shoulder lightly. “Answer one question for me. Is it someone in this house that you’re interested in?”

“... Yeah.”

“And you’re positive it’s not me?”

“Not answering that one.”

Oh well, I tried. But this is still a riveting development and I can’t wait until Kenji gets home for the night so I can tell him about my brand new sparkly •:°*idea*°:•. I think he’ll agree that it’s even more exciting than the original plan of merely finding a boyfriend.

Not long after, Chikara lets himself into the house and I wave. He smiles and asks to join the game so Kenma and I scoot over on the couch to make room for him.

Within the next hour, everyone else arrives home in various states of exhaustion but somehow or another, the nacho bowl keeps being refilled (me. It was me. I refilled the nacho bowl.) and we’re all soon gathered in the living room, passing controllers back and forth to take turns playing. Kenji ends up in my lap for a few minutes, then decides he has the right to stretch out across the entire couch and the laps of Kenma and Chikara still sitting with me. He’s mostly talking to Shigeru, leaning on the back of the couch, hair still dripping from the shower he took after returning home from practice. Evidently not even he could be enough of a kill joy to resist hanging out with the rest of us on a lovely evening such as tonight. On the other couch, Kenjirou and Keiji both hold controllers though neither are very good against Kenma who is still player one but even they look like they’re having fun. In Keiji’s case, fun looked like laser focus on the screen. In Kenjirou’s, it meant a continual string of swear words that I didn’t even know of paired with stony-eyed refusal to give up the controller. I love my friends.

Night fell quicker than I wanted it too but we played on with little regard for the regrets we might have in the morning. I’m about to win the current level when Kenji taps me to grab my attention. On the other couch, Keiji, Shigeru, and Kenjirou spectate, sitting rather close together in my opinion. Kenji shoots me a look like “what the heck, I thought we were the ones doing the seducing here” so I give him back a look like “broski don’t even stress about it. Just wait until you hear about my new and improved plan for world domination.”

I think that alone is enough to warrant wrapping up the night since I want to talk to Kenji in private and everyone looks pretty tired too — even the quality of gaming has decreased from everyone except Kenma pretty much.

“I’m going to bed!” I declare, standing up and almost throwing Kenji onto the floor. “And if anyone decides they need an extra mattress for any reason, Kenji and I won’t be needing separate beds anymore so let me know if anyone wants it!”

I get some eye rolls in response but a few laughs break through as well as Kenji and I close our door, seeing the others slowly starting to follow suit as well.

Kenji smirks and eyes the both of our beds. Obviously, there’s no need to ask if I was serious out there and I throw myself onto his bed, making only enough room for my best friend that we are _unfortunately forced_ to cuddle.

“And at the end of day one, we are both sadly still single,” Kenji laments.

I poke his nose and grin. “I HAVE A NEW IDEA THOUGH AND ITS BETTER THAN THIS ONE.”

Kenji winces and flicks me. “Well, you don’t have to announce it to the entire house. Thanks.”

I laugh an apology, unable to keep from wiggling and tapping my hands on his chest. “Okay but hear me out. I was hanging out with Kenma and he _may_ have hinted at some interest in someone in this house.”

“Is it me?”

“Dunno. It’s Kenma so I feel like it’s more likely to be Keiji or Chikara. But you might just get lucky. But it got me thinking! Trying to woo everyone here is fun, but like. What if we play matchmaker instead, huh? Cuz we both know Kenma well enough to know he’s never going to make a move. And if it is Chikara or Keiji, who knows if they’ll ever make a move either. Honestly, we’re doing everyone here a favor. Yes?”

Kenji’s face slowly morphs into the most beautiful, evil smile I’ve ever seen. That boy is art. Terrible modern art that doesn’t make sense, but still, art. I know this is the best idea we’ve ever had. And the results promise to be incredible.

“Imagine a world,” I begin, letting the light from the stars outside fuel my super powers, “where Kenma actually joins us at the table for dinner because he’s got a boyf. Or better yet, imagine a world where someone has the power to calm Kenjirou down when he’s pissed at us for no good reason at all because someone has the key to his heart. Or a world where we watch a blossoming romance and a very special someone makes time to go to every single one of Keiji’s performances because he’s the love of their life. Or a world where instead of getting home from volleyball every night and tiredly sulking around the kitchen, Shigeru runs home to leap into the arms of his lover. Or a world where Chikara keeps being like the best person out of all of us somehow but he has someone who deserves him and someone can be sweet to him in return.” I smile in the darkness. “That’s a pretty good world, don’t you think so?”

“What are you and I up to in this imaginary world?” Kenji asks, one eyebrow quirked.

“Probably this.” I kiss his jaw and move so I’m laying on top of him. He puts his arms around me and laughs into my shoulder. There was definitely no way for this plan to not end in success for everyone.

 

As soon as the sun is streaming back in through the window, I’m awake. In the night I use my reserve sunlight powers to generate ideas so I’m ready to start working on the new matchmaking plan immediately.

Kenji groans about wanting to sleep later but we both have class a little later in the morning so there’s no time to spare if we want to draw up our battle strategies.

While I shower, he sits on the bathroom counter with his physics notebook open to the very last page, now dedicated to this plan instead. “Okay, we’re going to write some fake love letters and set up some blind dates to get people to realize their feelings and act on them. What else comes to mind?”

I yell over the water. “Fanfiction would have us start conflicts because that’s what brings people together. Like someone’s bedroom floods and they have to share a bed with someone else— We’re not flooding anyone’s rooms though, Kenji. Don’t get any ideas!” But maybe some sort of minor crisis would help people to realize their feelings.”

“This is perfect,” Kenji says, scribbling in his notebook as I finish getting dressed and ready.

 

All of us but Keiji and Kenjirou eat together that night, clustered around the kitchen table with a pizza between us.

“So does anyone here happen to have more clues as to who Keiji’s crushing on?” I ask around a slice, watching everyone’s reactions very carefully. Kenma looks up immediately, Shigeru raises an eyebrow, and Chikara stops chewing.

“What?” Chikara speaks first. “I didn’t realize that was a thing.”

“Apparently so,” Kenji inspects his fingernails casually like the suave beast he is. “Yuuji was teasing him about a cellist girl in one of his courses and he all but admitted he liked one of us. But he clammed up real fast again, didn’t he, Yuuji.”

“I can’t blame him,” I shrug. “I wouldn’t go around announcing it either if I liked one of my housemates in secret.”

“Except you did,” Shigeru gestures between me and Kenji. “Clearly you would announce it.”

“Well we didn’t announce it to everyone else until we had it figured out ourselves,” Kenji argued. “And... t-b-h Yuuji and I decided maybe _dating_ isn’t what we’re meant to do. We make pretty good best friends and we don’t want to wreck that with the expectations of dating.”

I lean into him, smiling. “Yeah. That’s what we decided anyway. Doesn’t mean I don’t love him, but I think we’re closer to invincible when we’re like this. And we can still cuddle even if we’re just platonic.”

Kenji elbows Chikara next to him. “That means I’m available if anyone wanted to make a move b-t-w.”

“Wait, but what about Keiji,” Shigeru butts back in. “That seems odd for him.”

“To have a crush?” I blink innocently. The plot thickens. “Anyone’s allowed to have one of those. Some are just better about keeping it hidden. Are you implying something, Shigeru?”

“No!” but Shigeru blushes slightly. “It just seems like a hassle to have a crush on someone you live with.”

“And how would you know about that?” Kenji teases. “I smell a confession.”

Shigeru stands up from the table, shooting fire out of his eyes at Kenji. He takes another slice of pizza from the box and storms to his room.

“Anyone else got a confession to make while we’re at it?” Kenji leans back in his chair.

“I can talk to Keiji about it when he gets back from practicing,” Kenma says quietly. “I... didn’t realize what he was feeling but maybe he’ll open up about it. Pining isn’t fun.”

Chikara smiles and pats Kenma’s back. “Thanks for looking out for him. I doubt it’ll be an issue if there is something going on between us all. I mean, no one thought twice when Yuuji and Kenji declared their status. Or you never know, maybe it’ll end up similarly to them in that sometimes really good friends is all you really want. But that’s a good thing to declare as well so everyone’s on the same page.”

“Chikara, you’re too good for this world.” I lean on my elbow. “This house would’ve fallen apart without you on day one.”

He smiles in response to that, his cheeks growing warm from the compliment. “Thanks, I just don’t want there to be unspoken thoughts or unnecessary conflict. Maybe I’ll put myself out there and be the first to confess that you guys are _all_ very important to me and I can’t imagine not living with you all. It feels so right now that we’re all here, like we were meant to end up here together and something just wasn’t complete until now.”

It feels good to hear those words so I jump out of my chair to hug Chikara from behind. I’d be lying completely to say I didn’t feel the same. Moving in with the other guys feels like a puzzle piece fitting into place. Despite the original plan, I don’t know what I’d do if one of them came to me because that would mean saying no to the rest which didn’t feel great either. Maybe we’re perfect the way are.

Kenji bolts out of his seat as well, running to swing Shigeru’s bedroom door open. “Chikara just confessed his undying love and friendship to all of us. Thought you should know.”

“Thanks, Chikara,” Shigeru yells. “Maybe get Kenji out of my room if you love me so much though, thanks.”

 

Dinner disbands pretty quickly after that but there’s a light feeling in the air. Kenji and I get back to work immediately, accessing the only deserted room. The note reads “Kenjirou, I don’t plan on acting on it because I don’t want to cause drama if you don’t feel the same, but I’ve always liked you and thought you were very special to me and I wanted you to know.”

I flip on the desk lamp, putting the note in the spotlight where Kenijrou will see it first thing when he gets home from work.

Kenji glances over his shoulder at the open doorway. “Since it’s Kenjirou, I will ask this. I know we’re trying to get him to think someone likes him so he feels confident going after someone if he has feelings but what if there isn’t anyone here who actually would date him? This whole plan rides on a lot of assumptions. Like the assumption that Kenjirou can at least put out the effort to be likable.”

“Well, no one else, if he asked me out, I’d say yes in a heartbeat.” I’m not sure what any of the others are actually feeling or if this scheme is foolish but the note isn’t a lie. Ooh, dating Kenjirou. Yes please.

“That’s fair,” Kenji sighs. “Make that two on that list.”

I raise an eyebrow and hurry back out of the room with Kenji. “Maybe we will have to flood his bedroom. Is there a less destructive way to get him into our room or do we have to go to extremes? I think flooding the house would be well worth it but he would also be pissed at us.”

Kenji leads us back into our shared room and flops on his bed. “It’s still an option. But probably the last resort after just tying him up and kidnapping him. What if we all go out together to a movie or something to egg this on. I think everyone is on the lookout at this point and we might be able to make something happen without even having to do anything.”

I pause in the doorway. The thought of going out to see a movie with everyone else is amazing and I can’t wait. “Maybe we’ll go this weekend! I’ll go talk to everyone who’s home right now!”

“Sounds good. I’m going to sleep.”

“Kenji?” It’s not even that late in the evening and neither of us have gotten anything done other than start drama amongst our friends. “Are you okay?” Maybe he’s dying. He’s not allowed to. That would give me the reputation of boyfriend-killer and I can’t be that!

He shifts on the bed and grins. “You keep waking me up at the asscrack of dawn. Not that I mind sharing a bed with you, but I need my beauty sleep too.”

I laugh and race over to kiss his cheek before I flee to the hallway again to go recruit for the movie this weekend. Keiji is home now too, slipping in silently at some point apparently and he and Kenma are doing homework at their desks when I barge into their room. Both agree to going out Saturday night. Kenma shoots me a look that says he’s probably onto the matchmaking game but that’s fine by me. Smart cookie right there. Maybe he’ll join in on mine and Kenji’s plans sometimes. He looks like he has the makings of an evil genius in him.

Chikara is also on board and restates how much he loves us all. I hug him again because I feel the same.

He kicks his feet under his desk chair, looking at me with a sparkle in his eye. “I was thinking we should make Saturday nights a hang-out night for us anyway since it’s one of the few times we all have free most of the time. Shigeru has volleyball practice in the morning instead of the evening and Saturdays are one of the only days Kenjirou has off work. The rest of us spend our evenings studying anyway but if we block out a few hours on Saturdays I think it would be a good opportunity to unwind. For all of us. And the image of just hanging out playing video games or watching movies or going out for dinner every week just sounds like something we should do. We’ve all gotten really close really fast living together and it would be a waste not to take the time to appreciate the friendship we have.”

I smile. I like talking to Chikara. He gets it. Like a true bro.

“Maybe we should stay in this weekend instead of going out.”

“Oh, I didn’t mean to shoot your idea down.” Chikara joins me sitting on the bed. “I think going out all together is fun.”

I wink and take his hand gently. “But then we have to deal with other people and being presentable and not being too loud. I like staying in too. We can order dinner in and rent a movie and we can be as loud and obnoxious as we want. Because that’s more true to us anyway, right?”

Chikara leans against me. “Okay. So tell me, is this about what you brought up at dinner? Because I’m onto you.”

“Maybe,” I laugh. Oh, Chikara. You think you're sooo cute. And you'd be right. “I just want us all to be closer and not keep anything from each other if there are feelings.”

“Well, I’ll back you up if I can. I want everyone to be happy.”

We stay sitting together for a bit before I leave again to go pass along the message of the night in.

Shigeru responds to the invitation with a raised eyebrow and I don’t blame him after the dinner conversation. (Kenji was right: we’re not that great at subtlety, are we...) I sit on his bed and offer a smile. “Look, Saturdays are like the only time we all have free in the evening and we all want to make the most of the time we have together so we want to make it a good time for all of us to just relax with a movie or something. Sound like a good time?”

He nods. “Yeah, but I see you trying to play wingman for literally everyone here so just promise me you’re not going to urge me to sit next to someone or get into anything with the lights off. I know you well enough to not trust your tricks anymore.”

I laugh. What can I say? I need a project to work on to make my life meaningful. “Promise I won’t do any of that. I love you all too much to try anything dumb just because I want to stir up the pot.”

“But are their other reasons you would do dumb shit like this?” Shigeru’s eyes narrow but he’s smiling as he pushes me away playfully.

“We both know the answer to that question I think.” I raise my hands in surrender.

Shigeru sits back down at his desk. “So where’s your partner in crime? Is he finally doing homework instead of plotting our demise as a household?”

I laugh and sit down on Shigeru’s bed, deciding to make myself at home. “He’s sleeping. I keep waking him up early and I don’t think he’s real happy about it.”

Shigeru smirks. “You could give him the night off if you wanted to stay in here.”

“Is that an offer to share a bed? Because I’m all over that.”

“Shove over, Cupid.” Shigeru joins me on the bed, abandoning his own homework. “I hate to admit is, but you’re good at this. And you’re welcome in here whenever. It gets lonely sometimes and you’re really warm.”

I’m warm! That boy-speak for “He’s falling in love”! I got him! Hook, line, and sinker! The boy is mine! The darkness of Shigeru’s bedroom is really comfortable and I’m a bit giddy just from being here so my brain stays on for a while longer than my body that slowly falls asleep. For that reason, I’m still awake and cuddling Shigeru (he lied. He’s the one who’s warm and nice to be next to. That’s more boy-speak for “I’m falling in love”) when there’s a knock on the door. I assume it’s Kenji coming to see where I’d gotten to, but when it swings open, the silhouette in the hallway light is much shorter.

Shigeru groans and sits up. “K-Kenjirou?”

Kenjirou takes a step back. “Yuuji, why are you here?”

“I could ask you the same thing!” My head spins. Did Kenjirou often find his way into Shigeru’s room in the dark of the night? Have I actually been onto something this whole time? Because that’s a plot twist I didn’t see coming. I’m better at this than I thought! I could be a detective! A love detective! I'll need business cards! 

“No!” Kenjirou flipped the light switch and crossed his arms. “Shigeru texted me and said something was up. I came to ask what was so important. He’s usually still up at this time and not _cuddling with you_.”

“I’ll swap you places if you’d rather be the one getting cuddled. Or you can just join in. There’s room in this bed for three.” There's a lot in this bed to love. And probably a lot to hate but whatever.

“Guys, please.” Shigeru blushes hard and elects to bury his face in a pillow.

Kenjirou’s cheeks are red too. “Fuck off! I’m not cuddling with anyone! I just came in to see what sort of disasters had taken place while I was gone today.”

I nudge Shigeru’s shoulder. “Very nice of you to clue him in on all the happenings around here. Now remind me, because I thought you two were mortal enemies. When did you start being so chummy?”

“About the same time we had to start defending ourselves from you and your dumbass ideas.” Kenjirou turns to leave but I race to grab his arm first. He smacks me with a piece of paper I recognize from when I put it on his desk. “Is this your doing as well?”

“Oh, what’s that? I’ve never seen that note before in my life! I wonder who it could be from! Good luck discovering who your true soulmate is, Kenjirou! I’m cheering for you! Good to know your first instinct when receiving an anonymous love letter is still to come to Shigeru’s room!”

Kenjirou pushes me to the ground but I’m laughing too hard to fight back. Shigeru hasn’t moved from his bed, a horrified look on his face. “Idiot!” Kenjirou plants his foot on my chest. “I recognize your fucking handwriting when I see it!”

I can barely breathe, whether from laughing or from Kenjirou stepping on me, (Keep it together, Yuuji. Don’t start hyperventilating.) but I don’t care. “You know my handwriting, Kenjirou? That’s so sweet!”

“Shut up! No one else in this house could possibly have such shitty chicken-scratch writing!”

“When you figured out it was me, were you excited?”

“Shut! Up!” (omg he was totally excited)

Another door down the hall opened and Chikara stepped out of his room, looking worried. “What...?”

“Yuuji’s playing matchmaker!” Kenjirou accused. “Don’t trust him.”

“Is that what this is all about?” Another door opens and Keiji leans against the doorframe. “And why Kenma is asking me about the crush I apparently have on someone here?”

“Yeah, well it’s working, so hah!” I jump to my feet and push Kenjirou into Shigeru’s room, pulling the door closed and holding it shut as Kenjirou screams and tries to break out.

Chikara is laughing and Keiji just sighs and turns to say something to Kenma who hasn’t shown his face.

I release the door and sprint back into my room, shaking Kenji awake. “Dude we’ve been discovered. Mission abort! If I die, you need to avenge me!”

A loud knocking on the door makes me jump. “Yuuji! What the fuck, man!” Shigeru seems to have recovered his wits and sounds pissed as well.

When the door flies open, all five of my other housemates block the way out, leaving me and Kenji trapped.

“Please don’t kill me!” I yell. “There has to be a Panic! At the Disco song I can sing to make up for this!”

“Yuuji, I don’t want to date anyone here,” Keiji spoke up. “I want what I think we all want. Everyone here is family to me and that’s exactly how I want it to be. I think you feel the same. If you’re looking for someone to fall asleep next to or share secrets with, I think that’s something that all the best families do.”

Kenjirou stuffs his hands into his pockets. “That’s polite-speak for ‘stop trying to set everyone up with each other and just let his house be.’ We’re chaotic enough as a family.”

“But,” Chikara interjected, “Yuuji, I think we needed to state that outright instead of letting it be an unspoken thing. So thank you for bringing it to light so we can all be more comfortable together.”

Did we all just bond? Did I just level up??

I grin and lean back against Kenji. “Well, then you’re all very welcome. I charge $25 per week if you want to subscribe for more brilliant ideas every day.”

“I think I’ll keep my money,” Kenma sighed and moved back out of the room.

“Yeah, this is a family, not a charity and you’re still an asshole.” Kenjirou throws the wadded up love note back at me (I’m keeping this as a trophy and proof that I wooed Kenjirou) and leaves as well with Chikara, Keiji, and Shigeru in tow.

“Can Saturday nights still be family game night then?” I call after them, getting no response. “Okay, cool! Thanks, guys!”

Kenji laughs nervously. “So that plan did not go as we had thought.”

I flop back onto the bed and shush him. “Yeah, I didn’t see that coming. I think we discovered a seven-way platonic _thing_ though. So it’s not a complete loss. And I think this means I can go sleep in other people’s beds if I feel like it. Which was the whole point, really.”

“Maybe wait a bit before you try it. A couple of them still looked pretty pissed that you outed them on their love for everyone else. You have to remember that there are a few of us in denial of every emotion they’ve ever felt. But they’ll get over it and then you can go spend the night in their rooms and let me get actual sleep for once in my life.”

Kenji falls silent after that, his arms around me as he falls back to sleep. I lay awake for a bit longer, thinking about the wonderful monster I may have created. What if we tore down all the walls in the house and made it all one big bedroom? Infinite cuddle puddle. I’ll run that idea by the others in the morning. See how it goes.


	3. Funny Story (im flunking out of college)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Story enhanced and told by Futakuchi Kenji

Why am I like this? Many have asked, few have gotten an answer. I refreshed the website to be sure it was up-to-date and correct and lo and behold, yep, I was still failing three of my four classes. Just another day in the life of me, I suppose.

The bedroom door squeaked as it opened and Yuuji imitated the noise as he entered, swinging his backpack at full velocity onto his bed. “Que pasta, homeboy? Don’t you  have class in like ten minutes?”

I leaned back in my chair and rested my hands behind my head. “The young live free. I have no time for things such as class. You still have much to learn, my young apprentice.” When Yuuji laughed, I sat upright again and minimized the window that was my in-progress grade report. Nope nope nope, I was not getting a lecture about this from the king of playing-around-instead-of-doing-homework himself.

“So what are you up to then?”

“I need to write a paper. It’s due tonight so I’m skipping class to work on it.”

“But—”

“Yuuji, stop. You like going to class. You get a lot out of listening to lectures in person. I do just as well reading the textbook and figuring things out myself. I’d rather use class time to get more stuff done. That’s just my style of doing things.”

“... Are you okay? You sound weird.”

“I’m not sick or anything. What do I sound like?”

“You sound like an asshole.”

I laughed. “Yuuji, I have a Ph. D. in being an asshole, remember?”

He laughed too and swapped his jeans for gym shorts. “Well, just know that since you decided to procrastinate your paper and I didn’t, I’m going to go play volleyball with Chikara and Keiji and you get to spend the evening inside. Hah!”

As Yuuji fled the room again, we high fived and I flipped off his teasing grin. Did I want to go play volleyball too? Yes. But this paper needed to be written as well. Yuuji was too good at sticking his nose into shit that wasn’t his to get into and he was bound to discover at some point the secret I had decided to keep. Everyone else seemed to be doing so well with school, balancing it with other activities. Of course, every group of friends had one designated stupid person to make everyone else feel better about themselves but I had never anticipated it would be me.

So, the only thing left to do was to get my grades back up before anyone figured it out.

Easy fucking peasy.

Five hours until the paper was due, six pages to write. Hop to it, genius.

 

The paper was finished with twenty minutes to spare. It might not have taken as long without the crime show playing in the background, but I was going to go crazy working in silence.

High school was never like this. I had always just gone to class, did whatever assignments didn’t reek of busywork and passed. I had never been a straight-A student as the others liked to point out, but I had always passed. This. College. This was different. Studying wasn’t my thing, never had been. And it wasn’t Yuuji’s thing either so I didn’t think asking him would be much help.

I had to go to class tomorrow; there was a test in physics 100 and skipping would mean an automatic 0%. There were no excuses for missed assessments in that class. I hadn’t been to many of the lectures lately but I’d been keeping up with the book, or at least doing my best to.

Yuuji was always on my ass about going to lectures but I didn’t like going. I didn’t know how everyone managed to get up and motivate themselves to go to class when it wasn’t mandatory. Kenma didn’t always go, but he didn’t seem to have any of the same problems I did.

The real problem was that I lived in a house full of low-key prodigies who didn’t look like much until they were compared to a normal dude, ie me.

Test tomorrow. Right. Study, Kenji. Don’t be the dumbass of the family.

 

So naturally, I gave up as soon as the next distraction was presented to me.

After a movie and chips with Kenma and Shigeru after he got home from volleyball, I went back to studying but it didn’t look any more appealing now than when I’d given up before. It was hard to resist when Shigeru walked in smelling like whatever expensive soap he liked, tired from practice and practically ready to fall over.

Yuuji, Keiji, and Chikara came home a bit later with Kenjirou in tow after they’d picked him up from work like he hated.

Shigeru was asleep on my bed so Yuuji shuffled through the room without turning on the lights. He patted my shoulder. “Still hard at work, are we? Considering you smell like soap that’s way too expensive for your taste, I’d say not—”

“Yuuji. Shut it.” I warned quietly. “I’m studying, okay. I need to do things my way and I just can’t spend all night working. I need a brain break sometimes and I happen to be on snuggle terms with several members of this household which happens to be a pretty good break.”

Changing into fresh pajamas, Yuuji paused behind my chair. “And you’re sure you have everything under control?”

“Yes, why wouldn’t I?”

“Because you’re acting weird and I don’t like it and I don’t know what’s up with you lately.”

I couldn’t see him well in the dark, but I looked straight at Yuuji. “It’s nothing you need to worry about. It’s just one of those weeks with a lot going on so yeah, I have a lot on my plate. Sorry I didn’t go play volleyball with you guys tonight if that’s what this is about. A little stress is healthy, right? Thanks for having my back. I have a test in the morning and then things will cool off again, I promise. I’m sorry if I’m being an asshole lately.”

Yuuji hugged me backwards from behind the chair. “It’s okay to say you’re having a busy week. The perk of saying something about it is that I don’t worry about you as much and I don’t nag you about it.” He kissed my cheek. “This is me apologizing. I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were having a long week.”

“It’s okay. I’ll be back to normal soon.”

“Yep.” Yuuji leaned around me and shut off my computer.

“Dude, what the hell!”

“There are studies out there that show that getting a full night of sleep will actually help you to do better on tests than if you spend the whole night studying.”

“Thanks, Mr. Psychology major, but I think I got it under control.” I stood up anyway and crawled into bed. Shigeru shifted and leaned into me. After tomorrow, I was getting down and dirty with pulling my grades out of the gutter and I could stop being an asshole to the people who mattered most to me.  I wasn’t going to be the obligatory dumb person of the family any longer.

 

Friday afternoon. The test had gone about as well as expected that morning — meaning I could’ve gotten about the same grade if I had skipped class and gotten the automatic 0%.

In the living room, Yuuji and Chikara were partaking in the normal ritual of playing the Rebecca Black song on max volume in an effort to annoy everyone else out of the house. Usually, I would’ve been there with them, laughing as Keiji actually pulled out his violin at home and tried to annoy us back, but no, just here, at my computer, three binders laid out in front of me, still struggling to figure out how to get back on track.

I’d turned in a few late assignments for partial credit and my grade report now reported two F’s in math and composition, a D in physics, and one glorious C in chemistry. There was still a lot of work to do if I was going to pass this semester and it had to be done quickly to get Yuuji out of my hair. He’d looked hurt that I hadn’t joined the Friday party in the living room.

That was no concern of mine at the moment though as this would all be worth it once I got back to a good place with grades. That meant facing a difficult fact: I wasn’t going to accomplish anything here.

I packed up my laptop, bidding the others in the living room farewell as I headed to the library. It was open 24 hours a day and I was going to utilize that. I wasn't going to leave until I was totally caught up. It may have been a stupid plan but at least no one could call me a wuss.

 

I made it until 2 am reading out of textbooks before the lines started blurring together and I passed out at the desk but woke up again a few hours later to a door shutting somewhere else in the building. I wanted to go back home, but couldn’t. Not yet. Not until I’d done everything I could.

More students used the library on weekends than I had thought but it was nice to be surrounded by fellow struggling scholars, most looking about as stressed as I was.

 

That lasted until lunchtime when I needed food and decided to bail. Nothing from the vending machine looked very appetizing so I decided to call it a day and head back home. The small house was cozy and inviting and so much more relaxed than the tense vibe at the library. Video games were in session in the living room and I greeted Yuuji and Kenma who were hard at work kicking the crap out of each other’s characters, then microwaved some chicken nuggets before retreating back into my room to keep working.

Progress was slow but promising and I thought I might be able to get myself back into a good place by the end of the weekend.

Then there was a knock on the door. Yuuji wasn’t one to knock on anyone’s door, much less his own bedroom door so I knew it wasn’t him. “Come in?”

Kenjirou didn’t make eye contact until he had seated himself on the edge of my bed. Then he lifted his gaze and stared straight through me.

“I’m failing everything,” I blurted without even being prompted to speak.

He nodded slowly. “That was a lot easier than I was expecting to get a straight answer out of you. Yuuji sent me in to figure out what’s been up with you since you won’t tell him and apparently I’m his polar opposite so maybe I could find out. For one of Yuuji’s ideas, it actually worked.”

I was blushing, pretty sure, whether from my friends worrying about me or from admitting that I was the designated idiot of the family to Kenjirou of all people. “Yuuji would’ve said something like ‘It’s all gonna be okay!’ and assured me that I’m not dumb and he would’ve been all sympathetic. You make me feel stupid just being around you and you wouldn’t try to give me sympathy. So yeah, he probably had the right idea sending you in.” Respectful eye contact forgotten, I studied the floor.

“Let me see your grades, Kenji.”

I shoved my laptop around so he could see it. I watched his expression remain neutral as he looked through each class, each test I had bombed and each assignment I had never turned in.

“Kenji... Has it ever occurred to you in your tiny, stupid little mind to ask for help if you’re not doing well? I literally spend four hours every Thursday evening tutoring in math. You could come. Or since apparently we live together I’m expected to care about you extra or something, you can ask me when we’re both home for help. Same with your comp class. I’m a communications major. I can probably help you with that too. Keiji took advanced physics in high school. Chikara’s an excellent writer. Kenma enjoys math as well. Shigeru isn’t half bad at physics either. Yuuji’s trash at all of it but somehow gets amazing grades because he’s got some crazy memory that doesn’t forget a single thing he hears in a lecture. He’d be a great study partner and you know he’d never turn you down. What I’m saying is you’re only alone in this by choice. If you’d reach out, we could’ve helped you and it wouldn’t have had to get this bad in the first place.”

I ducked my head. As expected, it all seemed very obvious when Kenjirou explained it and I didn’t feel smart in the least. “How do you guys do it? I mean I get that the rest of you are all just plain smarter than me but everyone else is doing well and I can’t keep up even though I have been trying really hard all semester. Maybe college isn’t my thing and maybe I’m not capable of anything past the bare minimum of high school.”

“I wouldn’t say that. College is just different. I think you’re trying to do the same thing as you did in high school which isn’t going to work. It takes a change in mindset to figure out how to do well in college but I don’t think you’re incapable of that. You just need to make the choice to study when you didn’t before and ask for help when you were fine on your own before. And ask if it’s worth it to you, if you want this education. Because for some people, it’s not worth it and that’s valid too.”

I looked up. Kenjirou’s expression hadn’t wavered. He looked calm. He still wasn’t offering me sympathy, but he was offering solutions. “You’re right. I need help. Please help me get my grades back up.”

“Sure. But forget about sleeping in tomorrow. We’ll go to the library first thing in the morning.”

“Why not start right now?” I gestured to my binders and textbooks strewn across the desk, hoping to get at least a little of my dignity back by proving I wasn’t a total lost cause. “I’m in the zone and I want to do everything I can.”

Kenjirou stood up from the bed. “It’s 6:00. On a Saturday night. The rest of us are waiting on you.”

Saturday night. It hadn’t even registered to me that it was family hang-out night. I was turning into a nerd if I’d managed to block out family night with thoughts of studying!

I hurried to stand up and follow Kenjirou out of the room where everyone was indeed standing around the living room, chatting quietly. They looked up as I exited my room and they smiled. It almost felt creepy, but I suppose I deserved the unnerving smiles after a feat so strange as living overnight in the library and forgetting about family night because I was busy studying.

“Sorry for the holdup, guys,” I said. “And for being kind of a dick lately. I’ve been stressed about school. I’m failing pretty much everything but I didn’t want to look like the only dumb person here by admitting I needed help.”

There were no calls of sympathy other than a clap on the back from Yuuji as he pulled me out the front door. “You are such a strange idiot and for some reason I love it. I’m glad it’s something stupid like grades though. I was worried something actually bad happened to put you in that mood. I’m hungry though, so let’s g-t-f-o!”

I smiled. “Where are we headed to tonight?”

“Well, you and Yuuji are usually the party planners, but we didn’t know what you would be up for.” Chikara shrugged and showed off the backpack slung over his shoulders. “So we made sandwiches and we’re thinking of finding a park somewhere just to hang out.”

“We had talked about doing something like go-carts this week, I thought.”

“Kenji.” Kenma raised one eyebrow. “You spent all of last night in the studying. You’d do nothing but crash and then complain for the next three weeks about it not being fair and then we’d have to go back and do go-carts again.”

A slow smile crept onto my face. “What’s wrong with go-carts again? But picnicking for tonight sounds fine. Thanks, guys.”

Keiji grabbed my car keys off the hook by the door. “And forget go-carts; we’re not letting you drive a real car either. If you trust me to drive your car.”

“I’ve let _Yuuji_ drive my car before. Yeah, I trust you.” I waved Keiji off and climbed into the passenger seat of my own car, Yuuji diving into the back seat to loudly remind me that he wasn’t a _bad_ driver, per se. I agreed. But he wasn’t a good driver per se either.

 

The park the others had chosen wasn’t far from home and it was a little busy with college students and families all enjoying the cool autumn evening. A short distance away, we found a quiet grassy hill to call our own. At the bottom of the hill, a few people fished in the small catch-and-release pond. It was relaxing to watch them. It was a very relaxing way to spend an evening overall.

I was handed a sandwich which looked really good after staring at nothing but paper all day but I did my best to savor each bite with the others as we watched the people by the lake and the bright colors of the sky while the sun set. This was definitely a better way to spend the evening than more studying.

Chikara, sitting next to me, nudged my arm. “You doing okay? If you really need tonight to work or sleep or whatever, we don’t have to stay here long. We just wanted to make sure you got out of the house for a bit.”

“Hey, cut it out with the sap, okay? I’m fine. Now you’re just embarrassing me for being the only one struggling. I’ll manage.”

“But you’re not the only one struggling, Kenji.”

I looked up. Everyone’s eyes were on me. Yes, their expressions held sympathy, but there was more. Empathy. “...Really?”

Yuuji huffed a sigh and laid down in the grass on his back, watching the sky darken. “Not everyone struggles in the same way, Kenji. But we’re all feeling the strain of how much work college is. I... I’m changing my major.”

Kenjirou groaned and Shigeru cheered. “Pay up, prettyboy.”

“Yuuji, you just lost me $20, I hope you’re happy.” Kenjirou rolled his eyes. “I thought you were excited about psychology.”

Yuuji seemed to find it funny that his friends were betting on his future. Typical Yuuji. “I was... it was good and all. But I’m thinking of moving to sociology. It seems more like me, don’t you think?”

“A month,” Kenjirou mumbled. “We’re a month into the semester and he’s already changing his major.”

I smirked and patted Yuuji’s shoulder. “I’m glad you’re figuring out who you are and what you’d like to do, man. Apparently, college is where you do that so kudos to you. People change their majors all the time so don’t stress about it.”

Yuuji smiled warmly then went back to looking at the sky. “Yeah, I’m not too worried. It’s probably going to set me back a little though since all the classes I’m taking right now are for the psych major so this semester is essentially just going to be wasted. I mean, it’s not a waste, and I don’t have regrets or anything, but next semester is going to just be starting over again from square one which is a little frustrating.”

Keiji laid down as well. “But if it’s going to help you get a job you’re going to love, then it’s all worth it.”

“Yeah,” Yuuji agreed. “I want to help people so I thought psych might be good but there are other opportunities in sociology that seem more like me. I just... I dream of a future where I get to be around a lot of people and I get to make them happy because that makes me happy. Ever since I was a kid, I knew I wanted to make an impact on someone. That’s what I want from the future.”

“That’s a good dream,” Shigeru said softly. “You’re going to be great at helping people. And if you want to change your major again, you’ll help me win another $20 off Kenjirou.”

“Fuck off,” Kenjirou said, stretching out in the grass as well. “I’m done funding your gambling habits, Especially when it involves our friends and what they want to do with their lives.”

“Right now I’m betting on you getting burned out from all those classes you’re taking right now.” Shigeru sounded confident in that much. “Are Saturday nights the only time you aren’t studying, working, or sleeping? I’ve literally never seen you just relax.”

Kenjirou picked a few blades of grass from the ground. “Maybe I’m just a little impatient for the future to come. I feel like I’ve always been anxious to get out there. And if working harder now is going to get me out there sooner, it’s worth it.”

“I’m glad you’re savoring the prime of your life.” Kenma rolled his eyes and laid down with his head on Kenjirou’s chest. “No need to prove you’re the best or anything. We all already know that.”

I watched as everyone focused their eyes on the stars starting to show themselves overhead. I was the only one sitting up anymore so I slowly joined the others on the ground, leaning my head against Kenjirou’s as well, my shoulder touching Kenma, my hand finding Keiji’s as Yuuji propped his head against my leg. It felt nice to be fully grounded and so close to my friends. Listening to the others helped me feel a bit better about my own situation.

“I think I’ll be lucky to get through this semester myself,” Kenma admitted. “I don’t know if maybe I should think about changing my major too, but I don’t know if software engineering is for me. Everyone talks about finding what they love to do and feeling it click and I just never felt that. But maybe not everyone clicks when they find what they love... because I do love this. I’m just not all the way sure sometimes. Maybe I’ll try out something different like Yuuji. But Yuuji’s a lot braver than I am to switch focuses so easily. It scares me a little too much.”

The future _was_ scary, Kenma was right. And not feeling at home in what he was doing, that was also scary. But I knew Kenma wasn’t one to settle either. He wouldn’t stick with something he wasn’t passionate about. That wasn’t his style.

“I’m scared too,” Shigeru said. “I’m still undeclared and I don’t know how long I want to be taking gen ed classes before I need to figure out what I’m doing. Volleyball is still my everything. But eventually, I need to focus more heavily on school because that’s how I’m going to create a future for myself that I want.”

“Take your time,” Keiji reminded. “Things don’t all come together at once. Maybe volleyball should be your focus. If it’s what you love, then concentrate on that. Not everything makes sense at once.”

Shigeru scoffed. “Easy for you to say. You get to pursue your passion and people don’t label you as a dumb jock because music is a respectable art form.”

“Do you think volleyball is your passion?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Then it doesn’t matter what other people think. If that’s what you want to be doing in the future, then do it. If you want to get scouted for the national team, then just work harder to get that. It doesn’t matter what other people think.”

“That’s true. I haven’t given up on the national team yet. It’s way too early in the season to even hope to be noticed but I’m working my way up the ranks on the school team and tournaments are starting soon. I’m excited for that.”

“Good. Sometimes I miss the adventure of spending all my free time on sports. Music is so serious all the time. I love it and I love trying to perfect my craft but it’s also hard because of that.”

Chikara punched Keiji’s arm awkwardly from the ground. “Then come play casually with us more often and get some exercise.”

“I know, I know. Thanks for always nagging me to come play with you guys. It helps.”

“I know it helps me.” Chikara chuckled to himself. “Pursuing creative interests is hard. I feel like I’ve learned so much about film but you can’t teach ideas or style — you have to come up with that kind of thing on your own and that’s the hard part. That’s why I play volleyball: because there’s always a right move to make and you work more off of instinct than inspiration.”

I found myself smiling at the sky, now much darker. “I’m glad the only thing I’m stressed about is grades. Apparently, the alternative could be having an actual existential crisis and changing majors and worrying about feeling unfulfilled. I think I’m on the right path still so I’m going to work a lot harder to create success for myself in the future. Thanks, guys.”

Shigeru laughed. “I’m glad we could inspire you with our existential crises.”

I sat up again. “But I have to offer the same help you guys are offering me. Maybe study help is easier to give but if there’s anything I can do for you guys, just ask. Encouragement, brainstorming, distraction, anything at all.”

“Thanks, Kenji.” Kenma touched my arm. “Focus on your grades for now. You’re always a good distraction friend when I need it.”

“This is very High School Musical,” Chikara snickered, “but I’m glad we’re a family. I’m glad we have each other’s backs like this. It makes things a lot easier so I’m glad we all live together and can work through our problems like this. I always feel much better after sitting down with you guys to just chat about life like this.”

And it’s true. I’m grateful as well for my High School Musical family. We’re full of dumb jocks, ultra-nerds, and existential crises but it also means we’re full of good times, study partners, and encouragement. If any group of mismatched weirdos is going to find success in the future, it’s going to be us.


	4. Mistakes Were Made but at Least I Fucking Won

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trauma recounted by Yahaba Shigeru

“Shigeru, you’re the only person on this earth I trust. But I’m still not going to tell you what I’m planning. This is something only Kenma and I can engineer. Because we are, in fact, both engineers.”

Stuckup idiot. I could be an engineer too if I want to. He’s just making excuses. “Then why is Yuuji in on the plan? He’s not an engineer.”

Kenji leans over and kisses my forehead. “Because, darling, if you were in on the planning stage of this, you’d probably report me to the police. And he’s the other team captain.”

I’m not sure whether to be worried, angry, or offended. “You have the audacity to come into _my_ bedroom and sit with me in _my_ blanket fort and still keep secrets from me? You’re braver than I thought.”

“Shigeru, you can wait thirty minutes until it’s time to go. Then you’ll learn about the plan.”

As if I can be appeased so easily. Kenji has another coming if he thinks he’s going to get away with this without staining his hands. “If I guess it, will you tell me if I’m right?”

“Why not.”

The lights are dim from within the semi-permanent blanket fort in the corner of my room beside my bed. It had started out as a place to watch movies on my laptop without being bothered by the window glare, then it had become a quiet conversation space with Chikara one night, then Yuuji had caught onto the fact that I _had a fort in my room_ and any attempt to tear it down was met with loud scream-crying and unreasonable bargains. Admittedly, it is a nice place to hang out and it gives conversations within an aura like a mystery flick. And given the tidbit about calling the police about tonight’s Saturday Family Night plan, the vibe was probably appropriate.

“You mentioned teams. Are we playing capture the flag?”

“Nah, not really. That’s too normal of an activity. That’s the kind of thing we’d do for Family Night if we were in an alternate dimension where we’re boring.”

“What does ‘not really’ mean though?”

“I mean... We are in teams and we are searching for something. But it sure as hell ain’t a flag.”

“Oookay... So are you the other team captain?”

“Kenma and I are co-captaining. We feel the strong desire to kick Yuuji’s ass at this.” Kenji crawls out of the fort and stands up. “But I need to go get ready now.”

“We aren’t leaving for like a half hour. You take like five minutes to get ready for outings.”

“Yeah, well, we’re going to a five-star restaurant first. You might want to rethink the Cheetah Girls t-shirt.”

As Kenji leaves, I feel the life-force sucked from my very body. A five-star restaurant? And then something like capture the flag that might or might not be legal? I miss when Kenji was still flunking classes and his idea were more restrained.

 

Through a series of text messages, I learn that the others had very little idea of what was happening as well but we’re all waiting at the front door to leave at 7:00, dressed in the nicest clothing we owned. My hair isn’t well-styled in the least and I wish I would’ve known about this long before I’d be expected to hold my own at a classy restaurant. On the other hand, Chikara is nervously playing with the cuffs of his button-down shirt and he’s not even wearing a tie so I assume I at least won’t look as underdressed as some members of the group.

Kenjirou looks impatient but that’s nothing new from him. He breaks away from the rest of us to knock on Yuuji and Kenji’s bedroom door, only to have it fly open in his face as the three “““captains””” stride out, looking confident and cocky.

Knowing Kenji and Yuuji would both be useless, I go after Kenma, asking about our Saturday evening plans, but I get no response from him either until we’re standing in the driveway and Yuuji stops us from getting in the cars.

“Okay! We’re going to spend this evening playing a super fun game!” he announces, grinning a little too widely for my comfort levels. “Summer or winter?”

What?

“If you prefer summer stay where you are. If you prefer winter, go stand in the middle of the driveway.”

I stay where I am. Obviously, summer is superior to winter. Who likes winter anyway? I stay planted on the front step with Chikara and Keiji while Kenjirou defiantly crosses his arms from his spot in the driveway.

Kenji punches Kenjirou’s shoulder. “Nice choice because we’re going to win this battle. Get in the car.”

Yuuji smirked and saluted as the other team left. “Chikara, considering the other car is yours, may I ask you to drive?”

“Uh, yeah, but you’ll have to clue me in on where we’re going.” Chikara grabbed his keys and everyone else piled in.

“Well, first we’re going through the drive-thru at McDonald’s because we gotta eat.”

“I thought we were going somewhere fancy!” I yell, but we’re already backing out of the driveway. “That’s why everyone is dressed to the fucking nines! And you say we’re going to McDonald’s?”

Yuuji grins from the front seat and adjusts his own tie. “That was a lie to get everyone in fancy dress. But we need fancy dress because we need the James Bond sort of vibe going on for this. As fellow summer lovers, I’ve named us the Capri Sun Squad and we’re on our way to do some—”

“For fuck's sake is this why Kenji said it was potentially illegal? What the hell are we doing? Chikara, turn the car around; we’re not breaking any laws because the idiots of the family want to play mission impossible.”

Chikara just laughs from the front seat. “No, this sounds like fun! I’m in. What’s the mission, captain?’

Yuuji beams, proud to be called the captain. “We’re going to the foreclosed mall on the other side of town. We’re gonna break in, look around, and be the first to complete the photo-scavenger hunt!” Yuuji promptly handed out a printed list to the other members of the Capri Sun Squad and I look over it.

 

  1. A movie everyone in the group has seen
  2. Something with wheels
  3. Something that smells good
  4. Something haunted
  5. An item used in battle
  6. An item often bought once a month
  7. Something on sale
  8. Something dangerous (don’t die)
  9. Left-behind trash
  10. The last store in alphabetical order in the entire mall (first team to complete all other items and have at least one member touch the door here first wins a dozen donuts per person)



 

“Are you serious?” I ask. “Hell to the NO! This is the worst game of my life!”

Chikara shushes me as he pulls up to the drive-through. “What do you guys want?”

I’m dressed far too nice for all the murders I’m about to commit.

 

I eat slowly as we drive across town and look at the scavenger hunt sheet. I glance over at Keiji beside me. “Why do their ideas of fun always break the law. Why can't we just get pizza or something like normal people?”

Keiji just shrugs. “It’s certainly out of the ordinary. I think that’s what the others like so much about this plan anyway. That, and the prospect of donuts if we win. Just play along. I highly doubt we’ll ever do something this off-the-wall again.”

I can play along, sure. I’ll complete this little scavenger hunt, fine. But no one can force me to have a good time with it.

We park half a block away from the condemned building and meet up with the other team there (the Winter Soldiers, by name). We all sneak through a hole in the fence and I try to get a glimpse of the other team. Obviously, Kenji and Kenma have been on board with this plan since the beginning but I’m surprised to see Kenjirou looking pretty determined as well. What had they told him to get the Master Stick In The Mud fired up about a scavenger hunt through an abandoned building?

Honestly, why do all of Kenji and Yuuji’s plans involve breaking the law? Why can’t we just get pizza or something like normal people?

We creep through a broken window into the empty shell of the old department store. All around us are toys, racks of clothes, and shelves that used to hold food. The move-out was still in progress so the store looked like a half-complete skeleton of what it should’ve. It was definitely creepy and I wasn’t looking forward to this any more than before.

Kenji starts yelling so I shoot my glare in his direction. “Alright, teams! Hope you’ve got your battle strategies planned out because you guys are going down! Ready, set, GO!”

The Winter Soldiers take off sprinting out of the small convenience store and through the halls, their footsteps echoing loudly. Capri Sun Squad takes off at the same time, headed in the opposite direction, Yuuji cheering loudly.

A couple of items on the list were simple. There were sale signs all over from just before the store had closed and they’d tried to get rid of as much stock as possible. We took a photo of the first one we saw. A store displaying soap and candles lay invitingly behind a metal cage and Chikara snapped a picture of that to use as our “something that smells good.” There was trash all over the place, though Yuuji and Chikara insisted on taking a photo of a fast food cup with dramatic lighting and filters for the sheer irony of it.

A short distance away, Keiji pointed out a media store and we went after the movie we’d all seen. Behind the locked glass doors, it was difficult to get a good look at the actual products. The ones on display on tables were all we could capture with the camera but we had to stand with our faces pressed against the door for a few minutes, shouting out movie titles.

Naturally, Chikara had seen most of them and the rest of us had to argue about what we had and hadn’t seen before. Finally, I snapped a picture of something we’d all watched together the previous week and yelled for us to move on.

We turn away from the storefront only to find the Winter Soldiers creeping closer, surrounding us.

The Capri Sun Squad falls into defensive positions but I’m not sure what we’re defending. I roll my eyes instead. “It’s a scavenger hunt, guys. We just move onto the next thing and let them look at the movies.”

Chikara looks at me steadily. “We have the chance to buy ourselves time though. If we can keep them here while one of us keeps going, we can get a few items ahead of them!”

Keiji has the easiest escape so he makes a run for it. Kenma is closest to him on the other team but elects to stay put, knowing he won’t be able to catch up.

It’s three-on-three now and we face off. I’m standing directly opposite Kenjirou who is eyeing the movie store behind me. He runs forward but I push him back. It’s just like blocking in volleyball really, watching and waiting for whatever direction he might move in and then placing myself there to keep him away. “How many items do you guys have checked off?” I ask, watching his every move.

“Wouldn’t you like to know. I’ll tell you we’re over halfway done already.”

We only had four items done, including the movie. If Keiji could find a few more things while we held the other team away from the movie store, it might help us catch up. No matter what, I’m not going to be the one who lets Kenjirou get by me.

“Back off and we might let you live!” Yuuji yells at Kenji, who he’s wrestling with in the middle of the floor.

“You can’t tell me what to do!” Kenji laughs and pushes Yuuji away from him, sprinting toward the store.

Yuuji plants his foot even though it’s too late. “Yes, I can! I’m an authority figure! I’m the captain of the Capri Sun squad!”

Unguarded, Kenji races in through the middle, drawing Chikara over to block him. While he’s busy, Kenma slips in from the side. I have to admit with all of us in fancy dress, it does look pretty damn cool in a Bond-esque way.

When Kenma reaches the glass doors, he starts shouting off movie titles for Kenjirou and Kenji to agree or disagree with if they haven’t seen them.

“Let’s go!” Chikara yells, since we can’t do much else now that the Winter Soldiers have made it to the front of the store. We race after Keiji who waves us over from a distance away. He shows us pictures of a shopping cart and an issue of a popular magazine — something with wheels and something often bought once a month. We now have six items checked off the list. But the last ones seem really obscure and difficult to find. What kind of challenge was this anyway?

A hollering noise echoes through the deserted building from the movie store and I see the figures of our opponents running again, shouting about the next item on the list.

Yuuji jumps in place. “We have to hurry! What’s the next thing we can get?”

Keiji points to a nearby store directory map. “We should figure out what the last alphabetical store is in here and where that is and look for things on the way.”

I roll my eyes again. “Stop freaking out. The stakes aren’t that high. The prize is just donuts.”

All eyes turn to me. Chikara offers a trying smile. “It’s not about the donuts. Shigeru, this is the biggest competition we’ve had against each other. This battle is for the title. I don’t know about you but whichever team wins this is going to have my respect.”

Something clicked inside me and I saw the Winter Soldiers running out of the corner of my eye. I wasn’t going to let them have that sort of title. That honor would be ours.

It was like putting on night-vision goggles; everything became clear in front of my eyes. I saw a first aid kit hanging on the wall down a corridor lit only by emergency lights. “Something used in battle!” I pull out my phone to get the picture. “You guys go look at the map; I’ll get this one!”

Once I’m close enough to the first aid kit, I snap the picture and turn back. Out of the corner of my eye, something flickers. I turn. I can’t see to the end of the hallway as all the lights are out overhead. Then one turns on halfway down. It turns back off. The next closest light turns on. Off. The next light turns on, coming closer to me.

My phone is still on and I raise it in front of me, hitting the button to take video.

The light shuts off. The next one turns on. I feel cold, like a wind has swept through the mall and is pushing the lights toward me. I wait, doing my best to keep my hand steady for several more seconds as the lights keep coming closer. I wait until it’s the second closest light to me. Then a shiver rockets down my back and I run. I know it can’t possibly be anything to be afraid of, but I don’t want to see what happens when it’s the light right over where I was standing.

“I got the haunted thing too!” I yell to the others as I catch up.

They’re waiting for me at the directory, and already running.

“We’re done then!” Chikara yells. “I found a broken escalator with no railing. Falling onto the bottom floor is definitely dangerous. We just have to make it to the final store now!”

We’re all fast runners, being a group of athletes as we are and I follow along with my group at top speed until we’re pointed straight at the last alphabetical store in the mall.

I hear the cheering noises before I see them, but the Winter Soldiers are here too, looking at us, running to the same spot from a different direction. And they’re going to get there first.

I put on a burst of speed. I refuse to let them take this honor.

Kenji’s in the lead, I run faster. The store is right in front of both of us. I drop to the ground and slide on the shiny tile and my foot connects with the locked entrance of the store seconds before Kenji stumbles into it, breathing hard.

The others are yelling and I stand to my feet, not quite sure of what’s happening.

Then Yuuji is hugging me and screaming in my ear. Chikara and Keiji are grinning and I know we’ve won. Donuts aside, it feels _damn good_. And after that slide, I do feel pretty Mission Impossible.

Both teams exchange a few high fives and glares of derision before we wander into a wider part of the hall to look at the pictures we’ve taken. We’re laughing about the movies we have in common and our interpretation of “something used in battle” (Yuuji and Kenji admit that they didn’t even know what they had in mind when they put that item on the list). Everyone gets quiet though as I show the video of my run-in with the ghost of the electrical system, the lights of the dark hallway creeping toward me.

Kenji groans. "Too bad the ghost didn't kill you. Then we would've won."

I can't help feeling smug. "Bold of you to assume I can die."

Regardless, the spooky aura of an abandoned mall settles over us and suddenly everything looks haunted. For a department store that was open and functional just a few weeks ago, it looks like a tomb now and none of us like it.

The timed challenge is well over but we aren’t exactly strolling back to the broken window that was our entrance. I take a glance as we pass the hall where I’d seen the moving light. It’s pitch black now with no lights on. I don’t know what I wanted to see but that didn’t make me feel any safer.

Once we escape the condemned building, we release a collective breath and walk a little slower back to our cars, parked a block away. The moon is high in the sky by this time of night but it is nice to be freed from the building.

“So? Looks like you got invested in this anyway,” Kenji says, nudging me as we walk. “You were sooo set on not enjoying this. But look at that. You had a bit of fun, didn’t you.”

“Shut up.” I smirk. I still have enough in me for a murder if he doesn't shut up. “You know I can’t back down from a challenge of honor.”

“But is it worth it if you end up haunted by that ghost you found? What if it follows you home?”

“If it follows me home, you have to put up with it as well. Maybe I can appease it with some of the donuts you’re buying me.”

We reach the cars and Kenji smirks. “Do you want to ride back with us? I’ll keep you safe from your ghost.”

I just laugh and lean against Chikara’s car. “Hell no! Capri Sun Squad for the win!”


	5. Taking a Break From Ruining Each Others' Lives to Ruin Our Own Lives

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> by Kenma

The others said the semester has been flying by. I wasn’t sure how much I believed that. In a way, it seemed like only a day had gone by since arriving here... but that was because every day felt exactly the same. I knew none of the others would understand that if I tried to explain it them since no, not every day was _actually_ the same, but some of them can be so literal about everything that it’s impossible to say anything without it being picked apart.

Anyway, according to the others, the semester was “flying by” and midterms were quickly approaching. Naturally, that meant that the most I see of my housemates was their stress coping mechanisms.

Chikara has been asking me almost every night if I want to watch a movie with him so we’ve been getting our money’s worth of the Netflix subscription to say the least. I have a couple coding projects for class to complete and I can work on those sitting on the couch or in my room just as easily so I don’t mind the nightly movie rituals. Kenjirou keeps getting mad that Chikara is watching movies instead of staying busy but being a film student, Chikara is able to defend his hobby pretty well.

I can tell though that he’s not watching movies for the sake of the notes on lighting and camera position he’s scribbling in his notebook. He’s watching movies for the sole purpose of getting lost in a universe that isn’t his.

Kenji still stresses about his grades but Kenjirou has been helping him with content he doesn’t understand and Yuuji studies with him every day. I think that practice is good for both of them and considering how much progress Kenji has been making, I don’t doubt he’ll have everything under control by the end of the semester if he does as well as he thinks he will on midterms.

Shigeru has been quiet. He comes home late from volleyball most evenings, grabs snacks from the kitchen, and crashes in his room without talking to anyone. I have a feeling he’s just tired from working hard, but we all worry that there’s something else at play. (No pun intended) Yuuji convinced me to go with him to spy on one of Shigeru’s volleyball practices to make sure he wasn’t getting in conflicts there or anything. Quite the opposite, Shigeru looked really happy on the court and his playing was honestly amazing. My team in high school had never played his but I had seen him play before. And this Shigeru, two months into the school year, was a completely new beast. He was great. And Yuuji wasted no time telling him that after he was released. He looked a little embarrassed that we had been following him, but the praise made him happy.

Kenjirou was in the same boat, rarely home, hardly talking to anyone while he was home. Chikara had taken to checking up on him whenever possible. On more than one occasion though, that resulted in raised voices from down the hall late at night and Chikara crawling into my or Keiji’s bed without saying another word, just wanting to be close to someone.

Yuuji was as loud and optimistic as always, but there were moments I caught him staring into space. He wasn’t a staring into space type of person. If he was distracted, he was distracted by _something_ , not by nothing at all. A time or two, he caught me catching him zoning out and he smiled at me, bright enough to be blinding, a silent “Don’t worry about me; I’m fine!” But it was hard to be sure.

Keiji wasn’t as bad as any of that — which was good for me. I don’t think I could stand sharing a room with someone with his life in shambles like the others — but I could tell he was feeling the strain as well. If anything though, he was spending less time at school practicing in the evenings and looking a little unmotivated. Selfishly, I was glad because it meant he was home more and I liked his company. We hadn’t talked necessarily about it so I wasn’t sure what he was thinking, but I got the impression he was thinking hard about something and I didn’t want to interrupt.

I guess for all the attention I was paying my friends and their feelings, I might’ve been neglecting myself. But what was there to worry about? Every day was the same and I just did what I needed to in order to scrape by. The projects I had for classes were easy enough, including the coding I had to do for my software engineering courses. That was supposed to be the challenging part of my day, but it was painfully simple sometimes.

Each day was the same as the last and I wasn’t sure why. Hadn’t we all looked forward to college so we could invest ourselves in topics we really cared about? That’s what I had done, but for whatever reason, I wasn’t feeling any of the excitement about software engineering that I thought I would’ve. Ability Accquired: Existential Crisis.

 

Friday rolled around but the weekend didn’t promise much rest. Midterm projects and exams would be sprinkled through all of our schedules this coming week so a lot more studying than fun was in the agenda. We still had our Saturday night to look forward to but no one seemed up for planning anything extravagant. I was okay with that. Going out for dinner or something was ideal for me anyway.

Keiji came home from practicing violin at school around 7 pm and walked into our room looking worn out. He left the door open partially, his hands full with his backpack and a microwaved meal balanced on top of a stack of binders.

“Hey,” I said, minimizing the window on my computer where I was working on programming a simple flash game. The window behind it was an actual project for class that I should’ve been working on all afternoon.

“Hi,” Keiji responded. “Good day?”

“Alright.” I moved my mouse and watched the cursor lazily track across the screen.

Keiji chuckled, setting his things down and leaning against my desk to eat his dinner. “That’s the fifteenth day in a row you’ve said ‘alright’ to that question. Nothing interesting happened?”

I could only shrug. “The projects I’m working on are almost finished. But it’s hard to feel excited knowing this is all I’m really going to be doing for the rest of my life. I feel like I’m learning stuff I already know.”

“Well, you had some background knowledge going into this. It’ll get more challenging.”

Challenging, maybe. Exciting, probably not. “Guess so.”

At that moment, the door burst open. Keiji and I looked up to Chikara’s grinning face as he wielded the TV remote. “Friday movie night?”

“Every night is movie night with you,” Keiji chuckled. “I’m not planning on doing anything else tonight though so sure. What are we watching?”

As Keiji followed, he motioned for me to come with. I was already moving, unplugging my laptop and resituating myself on the living room couch. Shigeru and Yuuji were there as well, passing a bag of chips back and forth.

Chikara looked excited, seated between Keiji and I as he selected a horror movie to watch.

“Oh, no way!” Shigeru pouted. “Not a horror movie! I have volleyball tomorrow morning and I’ll never sleep if I have this on my mind!”

“Then don’t watch.” Chikara had no sympathy. “This is what we’re watching.”

Shigeru crossed his arms but didn’t move from the couch. I couldn’t say horror was my favorite genre either since cheap jumpscares always startled me and I didn’t find much significance to it. But with the flash game on my computer screen, I tuned most of the film out anyway.

It was close to 10 when the movie finished. Kenji had come home in the middle of it, complaining that we always did everything without him even though that was the opposite of the truth.

We hung out on the couches for a while afterward, talking softly in the darkness.

The front door opened again and Kenjirou dragged himself home from work. He looked at all of us with one eyebrow raised, as we sat around with no lights on. “Weirdos,” he muttered, heading straight for his room.

Shigeru jumped up from the couch. “Can I sleep with you, Kenjirou? They’re all trying to tell scary stories after that horror movie and I am _so_ not in the mood to lay awake all night thinking about creaking noises and shadows.”

Kenjirou paused with one hand on his doorknob. “And have you clinging to me all night? I’ll pass.”

With mixed laughter, we all disbanded, heading mostly to our own rooms, though Shigeru followed Chikara into his bedroom. Bad idea probably, considering Chikara was the one who was into horror in the first place. If I woke up to Shigeru screaming and Chikara laughing because of some prank, I would not be surprised — just annoyed.

Sleep came easily enough for me, only a few choice images from the movie burned into my brain for nightmare fuel.

Any dreams I had were vague and I didn’t remember them when I woke to sound — a crashing from somewhere in the house. I lay still and breathed silently for a full minute, trying to figure out if I had imagined it. The house was quiet but I thought I could hear very faint noises from beyond the door.

I thought about waking Keiji up but decided against it, rising from my bed alone. I lived with six other guys. If there was someone or something out there, they’d hear if it ate me.

There was faint light streaming in from under the door as I hesitantly opened it.

A shadow inhabited the kitchen, but I exhaled in relief when I recognized it as Kenjirou. I glanced at the microwave clock. “3 am. That’s my favorite time to come break our kitchen too.”

Kenjirou straightened from his kneel on the floor and tossed shattered glass into the trash can. “Sorry. Didn’t want to turn on a light in case it woke someone up.”

The coffee maker on the counter beeped quietly that it was ready.

Kenjirou turned away from me and got a new cup from the cabinet. He poured his coffee and started back to his room. “Sorry I woke you up.”

I followed him, slipping into his room behind him before he could shut the door. “Are you pulling an all-nighter?”

The mess of papers and books on his bed was pretty clear evidence that he hadn’t planned sleeping into his agenda for the night. His desk was sufficiently cluttered with assignment sheets as well, his computer screen filled with an inordinate amount of text.

I picked at a fingernail. “I’m not the type to lecture but, y’know, take care of yourself and stuff. Don’t let the others know you’re doing this because they will definitely lecture you.”

“I know.” Kenjirou’s voice sounded clipped. “I know my limits so just trust me that I have this under control.”

We hadn’t been living together long, but I was at least partially fluent in Kenjirou-speak by now. “This isn’t the first all-nighter.”

“Tomorrow. I’ll get plenty of rest tomorrow night. I appreciate your concern, Kenma.”

“How many nights?”

“Just two, consecutively. I promise I’m not going overboard.”

“You should work on faking it a little better. If I can tell, the others will catch on too. You look like shit.”

“After midterms, I’ll catch up.”

I didn’t know how to argue with Kenjirou. He could keep going all night. He’d put his foot down and wasn't making eye contact anymore. I left the room without saying anything else, but I’d... do something. Instinct told me to tell one of the others, someone good enough at verbal sparring to force Kenjirou into submission. But we were all stressed out by midterms in some way or another and I didn’t want to make it worse for anyone else. I was stressed too and seeing everyone else stressed wasn’t helping me. I dropped back into bed, unsure of what to do. Sleep found me easily again for the rest of the night, but I felt a bit guilty about it.

I even slept late. The door was ajar and Keiji’s bed was unmade.

The kitchen was busier and it felt warmer though the tension of everyone’s stress was still present around the edges of the room. Chikara, Yuuji, and Kenji were taking turns trying to flip pancakes as high as possible and still catch them with the pan. A fair bit of batter splattered the counter and their hands and most of the pancakes were a little deformed, but they were laughing along with Keiji, quietly watching them and Shigeru, dressed in practice clothes with a volleyball under his arm. Kenjirou was present, probably dragged out of his room to join in, but he had a notebook in front of him and he didn’t seem to be paying the shenanigans any mind. In truth, he didn’t look like he could focus that well on his notes either but that wasn’t stopping him from trying.

The messy pancakes were served and everyone sat down together and talked, which was a reassuring feeling, but we disbanded again when Shigeru left for practice. I watched Kenjirou walk back into his room and shut the door without saying anything, then I did the same. I had projects to work on too and at this point, anything else would be dangerous procrastination.

And yet, the will to do it wasn’t there.

Keiji left to practice on campus and I had no one to hold me accountable. I worked but slowly, unenthusiastically. I at least had the evening to look for since we had all committed that to each other like every Saturday. Midterms weren’t going to take that away from us.

My work was interrupted a little earlier than that shortly before lunch. My concentration was broken when I heard Kenji yell, “HOLY SHIT, DUDE! STOP MOVING AROUND; WHAT ARE YOU DOING?”

I stood up quickly. Normally, I might have just ignored the apparent crisis outside, but considering how tightly everyone was wound lately, I couldn’t sit still.

Keiji had said he wouldn’t be home until later, but his expression was strained and he stood against the wall, avoiding everyone else. Shigeru was on the couch, home very early from volleyball, his foot propped up on the coffee table while Kenji sprinted to the kitchen to fill a plastic bag with ice. Shigeru’s ankle looked badly swollen and his expression didn’t convey any sort of happiness.

Other doors opened as well, alerted to the problem at hand.

Yuuji ran over to Shigeru, asking repeatedly if he was okay while Shigeru yelled and pushed him away. Chikara looked nervous, like he wanted to help too but didn’t know how to and didn’t want to be annoying. Kenjirou stood in his doorway, watching silently with hard eyes.

Keiji took a deep breath and stepped forward again. “Can I borrow someone’s car? Walking back over here from the campus gym was hard enough but his coach says he should probably get it looked at.

Chikara finally left his bedroom doorway, grabbing his keys from the hook by the door and clapping Keiji on the back. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll take him. You have stuff to be working on.”

“So do you,” Keiji murmured. “I don’t want to go back to campus anyway.”

“My stuff isn’t as important,” Chikara argued. “You have to practice. If I don’t finish this project, it doesn’t matter.”

Keiji reached for the keys. “Stop that. Your projects take longer than anything I have going on. And it does matter.”

“No, it doesn’t.” Chikara’s voice rose to a near-yell. “Keiji, let me handle it. My projects don’t matter because I’m dropping out at the end of the semester.”

The room was instantly silent.

Chikara’s keys jingled in his hand as he stepped back over to the couch to help Shigeru back to his feet, taking the ice pack from Kenji.

Yuuji followed quietly, making eye contact with Chikara that communicated something personal. “Then let me come too.”

Chikara understood and the three of them disappeared through the front door, leaving the rest of us in silence.

Kenji spoke first after the sound of the car had faded away too. “Was that... Was that Chikara and Yuuji both announcing that they’re dropping out? On top of Shigeru being hurt?”

This seemed like an appropriate time to add to the pile of stress. I spoke up. “Kenjirou hasn’t slept in at least two days.”

“What the fuck!” Kenjirou glared at me but it lacked his usual intensity.

“I’m still having a hard time in a couple classes,” Kenji admitted.

“I don’t know if I want to be a musician,” Keiji confessed.

“I’m okay...” The three other sets of eyes in the room were on me. “I’m not okay. I lost some sort of passion for what I’m doing. I don’t know where I lost it or where it went but... I don’t think any of us are okay right now.”

Understatement of the century. None of us knew what to do with each other or ourselves. Everything had fallen apart so fast— No, it had fallen apart slowly, we had all just been ignoring our problems in hopes that it would all go away on its own. We were just stupid.

Kenji shifted his weight then moved to collapse on the couch. “Well, this just scrambles my eggs. I don't want to do anything else now; I'm too worried about Shigeru."

Hesitantly, Kenjirou moved from the doorway and sat next to Kenji, leaning against his shoulder. “I didn’t know it was getting that bad for him... He said he was stressed about not doing well enough in volleyball. I told him not to overwork himself. He told me to practice what I preach. And that was the end of discussion.

Keiji sat down on Kenjirou’s other side. “Is that what happened? He called me because I was on campus since he needed help getting home but he didn’t say anything else about it. I didn’t ask because I could see he was in a lot of pain.”

I joined the sad group on the sofa, hoping the others would be home soon. I thought it would feel better now that the others knew I wasn’t feeling great about school and we had all shared our secrets, but this still felt like isolation. Kenjirou was immediately asleep on Kenji’s shoulder and the rest of us were silently thinking, wallowing in our misery, all longing to be reunited with the others. It was true that we were stronger together, but that required us all to be together. Split apart like this we really weren’t anything at all.


	6. Spending Money on Three Medium Pizzas Instead of Counseling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -Shirabu Kenjirou

“I don’t know, I didn’t even realize it was getting this bad.”

“Kenma said, what, two days? Does that mean he skipped one night or two?”

“Dunno. I don’t think Kenjirou clarified.”

I groaned and tried to move. Everything felt numb and heavy.

“Shh! Kenji, you woke him up!”

“About damn time. Dumbass doesn’t get to sleep through Saturday night just because he’s tired. Newsflash, I could easily sleep through the evening every day.”

“Yeah, Kenji, we know you’re capable of sleeping like 14 hours a day. Is he okay?”

I shifted and finally got my arms underneath me so I could sit up on my elbows. My vision slowly came back into focus and I found myself stretched out on the couch. Kenji, Chikara, and Yuuji stood over me, varying degrees of concern on their expressions.

Kenji scoffed. “You still look like shit, dude. Nice job.”

I found the reserve energy to flip him off as I sat up all the way a rubbed my eyes. “Good evening. Why am I alive?”

Chikara checked his watch. “You were out for around six hours. How do you feel?"

Consciousness found me fully quickly and I stood up. “I’m fine. Pulling two all-nighters isn’t going to kill me. It hasn’t in the past.”

That apparently wasn’t the right thing to say as Yuuji dragged me back onto the couch. “Don’t move. Sleep if you need to. I don’t think we’re doing anything particularly interesting tonight together anyway.”

I looked around. Shigeru was seated at the kitchen table, one foot wrapped and resting on another chair while a pair of crutches leaned against the table. “You okay?”

Shigeru nodded back to me. He looked tired too. “Mild sprain. A week or two of staying off it and missing practice but that’s about all I can do. Sucks, but. Whatever.”

Still, I knew skipping practice for a week or two would be torture for Shigeru. He was usually so careful with himself on the court, making sure he didn’t overdo it. Maybe it had been a simple accident, but I noticed something in his eyes that said otherwise.

Yuuji raised his hand like he was in elementary school. “Question, since you’re awake and Shigeru’s okay and we’re all here and I don’t think any of us are planning on getting much done... can we still have Saturday night? Everyone’s been so isolated this week and I miss you guys.”

Shigeru nodded. I shrugged. The others smiled. Yuuji grinned and leaped into action, pulling board games off the shelf while Kenji grabbed his phone to order pizza.

I stood up from the couch and sat down at the table next to Shigeru. “You sure you’re okay?”

“What, you act like you care about me or something now?” Shigeru smirked. “Yeah, I’m fine. I told you—”

“I’m not talking about your stupid foot. I’m asking if _you_ are okay.”

Shigeru swallowed. “Maybe. Are you?”

“Maybe,” I agreed. “If you look hard enough, I think that’s the best answer any of us can give.”

“Yeah.” Shigeru snatched a game he wanted to play first, knowing no one was going to argue with a cripple. “We’ll be okay, though, right?”

I didn’t bother answering as everyone sat down at the table, pulling over barstools and shifting around to make room. Yeah, we’d be okay. Or die trying. You never knew with this group.

We didn’t stick to any particular game for very long, didn’t even finish any of them. A strange energy buzzed through the group and nothing was good enough to finish. Not because it wasn’t fun though, it was plenty of fun. It always was with them. I couldn’t help still feeling a bit tired and I gave up playing to win somewhere in the middle of Pictionary, content to shout out answers that didn’t make sense for the sake of pulling laughs out of the others, the way we all always did.

Pizza came and Chikara and Yuuji almost convinced the delivery guy to join our game. We tipped him well for putting up with our shit.

I questioned the presence of three entire pizzas but that was answered when I realized no one had eaten since the sloppy pancakes this morning. I’d slept through lunchtime. Chikara and Yuuji had been with Shigeru at the hospital all afternoon. Kenma, Keiji, and Kenji evidently hadn’t even considered food. That was rare for them but the circumstances probably warranted it

We finished two of the pizzas entirely and nibbled the third, mostly stealing half-eaten slices away from each other. We’d yet to actually finish a game.

Under normal circumstances, that would’ve annoyed the hell out of me, the fact that we kept moving from game to game without declaring a winner. But tonight I didn’t mind that we seemed to completely disregard some of the rules for the sake of fun. I glanced at my phone, noting it was past 9:00. We’d been at this table for almost four hours and we still hadn’t finished a game. At some point, we would have to finish a game, name a champion and go to bed. I knew they wouldn’t be letting me stay up late even if I felt better after napping half the day. Maybe that was why we didn’t play to the end of anything; because if we finished something we would be forced to admit it was time to call it quits for the evening.

I blinked out of my trance and got my bearings again, looking at the table, the cards in my hand, everyone’s eyes expectantly on me. I hadn’t even tried that hard to win. I laid down my last three cards on the pile and won.

Kenji sighed loudly and slammed a hand down on the table. “I was so close!”

I smirked and dug my hand into a bag of chips that had been full when we’d sat down but was somehow reduced to mere crumbs now.

We sat quietly for another few seconds. It was almost too dark to see each other well in the dim light we’d flipped on before it got so dark without our noticing.

“Well, I guess we should probably call it a night,” Keiji said the words no one wanted to hear.

“Wait,” Yuuji blurted. “I don’t want to be alone.”

“You’re not, idiot.” Kenji punched his arm. “What am I, chopped liver?”

“I don’t want _anyone_ to be alone,” Yuuji insisted. “And I don’t want to... I want to stay here at the table because we’re together and I don’t trust any of us when we’re alone.”

Chikara smiled softly. “I think we can make that work. Is anyone opposed to a slumber party in the living room? There’s enough space if we shove some of the couches around.”

We didn’t even wait for anyone to answer the question. We all wanted to. We all grabbed a few blankets and pillows from our rooms to contribute to the makeshift bed that took up the entire living room.

Shigeru stayed sitting on the arm of the couch, bossing us around, which he enjoyed, based on the smug expression on his face. I’d find a way to get back at him at some point when he wasn’t crippled.

Our positions were a little haphazard as we spread out on the floor but it didn’t take long to get comfortable. I couldn’t deny to myself that I was tired but I laid on my stomach with my chin resting on my hands to keep from falling asleep accidentally.

Shigeru had yet to lay down all the way, looking at the rest of us. “Thanks, guys, for helping me out today. I appreciate it, having people around who care.”

Chikara laughed softly. “So are you going to tell all of us caring people what’s wrong? You’re always so careful to stretch and warm up and play safely. You were lecturing us about that back in high school. I would’ve figured you’d be the last one to get hurt playing volleyball.”

“Well, I guess I got reckless, huh,” Shigeru murmured, finally stretching out on the floor, careful with his injured ankle. “That’s really all it was but I guess it’s still kind of a big deal for me. I didn’t mean for it to end up this way. I thought I knew my limits but I went too far I guess.”

“Why?” I asked. I knew the answer. It was the same reason any of us pushed our limits.

“Because I’m scared of not being good enough,” Shigeru answered for all of us. “You guys... You all have your dreams and your futures planned out and I guess I never felt like mine was good enough. I got in here on a scholarship to play volleyball and it was perfect because that’s all I ever wanted to do, but beyond that, I don’t know. My major is still undeclared and I know I still have time to figure it out but I don’t have any ideas so far. I guess I’m scared I’ll run out of time and have to commit to something. But ideally, I’d get scouted for a pro team before I ever had to do that and I could drop out and do that instead.”

“Shigeru, I think that’s a great dream,” Keiji said. “I don’t think it’s less than any of ours just because it doesn’t involve getting a degree. It’s _your_ dream to be in control of.”

“I know,” Shigeru said quietly. “But I got desperate. It’s way too early for scouts yet but I didn’t want to leave it up to chance. So I pushed myself too hard to be better.”

“Dude, I’ve come to watch you play,” Yuuji butted in. “You’re amazing.”

“Thanks. Sorry. I just... Yeah, I made a mistake. You guys had my back though so it’s okay. I’ll be more careful in the future.”

Chikara shifted and touched Shigeru’s arm. “Good. And for the record, I don’t think your dream is dumb because it doesn’t involve school. It’s not in the cards for everyone. I suppose I announced it earlier but I don’t think it’s in the cards for me either, at least for right now.”

“Yeah, dude, spill those beans,” Kenji whined. “That was a pretty big bomb to drop on us without a warning.”

“Sorry,” Chikara laughed. “I don’t have the most solid answer right now and honestly, that scares me so bad, but I think I’m going to drop out at the end of the semester. I might come back at some point but I don’t know if this is where I need to be right now. I still love film and I still want to be a director and I’m not giving up on that at all. And I think college is a great thing and a great place to learn and—”

“Chikara, spit it out,” I said. He’d be here all night trying to justify actions that didn’t need justification.

“Sometimes it’s hard to teach an art form,” he said simply. “The technicalities and techniques, yes. The equipment and methods, yes. But you can’t teach inspiration and so many rules are made to be broken and ever since I’ve come here I’ve felt idea-blocked. Like I’m always creating and doing what I love for assignments and then I’m too tired to do any projects for fun like I used to in my spare time. And I always felt like those fun projects that came straight from me were more inspired. There’s a part of me that’s terrified that my inspiration muse left or something and I want to find it again. I don’t know if it’ll be for good, but I’m going to at least take a semester or two off. Maybe I’ll travel or get a job. I just want to experience the world and get some more inspiration and figure some things out on my own instead of being handed the rules on a notetaker. It’s hard to explain art.”

“It’s valid, Chikara,” Kenma spoke up. “You have talent. And you’re right; you can’t teach that in a lecture.”

Kenji pretended to yawn. “Uh, not to be like sappy or anything because feeling emotions is so your thing and not mine, but an art like drawing or writing or film or whatever, that’s a feelings thing. That comes from the heart. So if your heart is telling you to drop out and see some of the world first, I think you should listen to it.”

Chikara was silent for a moment before he sniffled. His voice wavered. “Thanks, guys. I appreciate it. I don’t want to leave you all though because it’s been so good to live here—”

“We’ll be here,” Shigeru said firmly. “If you want to come back and visit or enroll again, we’ll be here for you.”

Yuuji spoke up. “Does that offer extend to me if I said I was thinking of quitting school too? Chikara and I talked about it a little bit when we were waiting with Shigeru, but I’m not totally sure about anything yet.”

“We’re all here sharing our sob stories so you might as well just spill it,” I said, earning a laugh. Good. If Yuuji could still laugh at sarcastic quips, he wasn’t too lost in his head yet.

“It’s like what Chikara is thinking but like, less thought-out,” Yuuji admitted. “I changed my major to sociology earlier in the year and I even switched out a few classes. It was better, I guess, but it just didn’t feel right. Chikara said it more eloquently, I just want to maybe take some time and live life. I’ve never worked a full-time job before but maybe that’s cool. Maybe I’d like it.”

“There’s no shame in not getting a degree,” Kenma said softly. “Plenty of people are perfectly happy without one.”

Keiji cleared his throat. “I agree with that sentiment. But, Yuuji, if I may ask, don’t you have a full-ride scholarship?”

“I do.” Yuuji’s voice wasn’t real firm either now. “And it makes me feel really guilty and like there’s something wrong with me. Because so many people say ‘college isn’t for me’ and that’s fine but it’s always what people say when they dropped out because it was too hard and maybe it’s stupid to feel this way but I don’t feel like college is maybe my thing but I don’t want people to think I’m stupid because I dropped out. My lowest grade is a 93%. I’m not stupid. And I don’t want people to think that I am!”

I choked on air. “93% is your lowest grade? What the fuck?”

Yuuji laughed half-heartedly. “You deserve that a lot more than I do for how hard you work, Kenjirou. I don’t know how I do it so I don’t have any secrets to share.”

“Yuuji, I think you’re solving your own problem here,” Shigeru said. “You’re smart. And it’s not hard to tell that when talking to you. Anyone can tell that there’s a lot going on in your head. You’re worried about people thinking you’re dumb when you say you dropped out of school, but they’re going to know that you’re smart just from talking to you.”

“It’s not all or nothing either,” I inserted. “It’s not like you can never get back in after you’ve dropped out. If you take a semester off and decide you do want to get a degree, you just reapply and come back. Most schools are in the practice of letting you keep your scholarships and everything too. Like we said to Chikara, we’ll be here.”

“But everything is so confusing!” Yuuji declared. “How will I know what I want? How do I figure out if coming back is a good option or if I should make my own way or what?”

Kenji smacked Yuuji’s arm. “Because you’re smart. You’ll know. And we’ll be backing you up.”

Yuuji exhaled. “You’re right. Thanks.”

“Duh.” Kenji was probably rolling his eyes though I couldn’t see him in the dark. But he probably was. “Evidently it’s my turn this time to be the one _not_ having a total meltdown,” Kenji continued. “Though if we’re sharing our fears, I’m still worried I won’t last in this program. Engineering is hard and I’m not magically smart like some of you.”

“Everyone’s first semester or two is hard,” Keiji reminded. “They have to weed out the weak ones somehow. And Kenji, you’re not a weak one. Stick with it. But only if your heart is in it. That sentiment doesn’t apply solely to artistic majors.”

“You’re right,” Kenji agreed. “But now you have to spill your guts about your heart not being in it.”

“Fine.” There was a hint of a smile in Keiji’s voice. “I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. It’s weird because I’ve been doing music for so long and I can’t imagine that not being my focus. But it’s like Chikara said, it can be really hard to teach art. And it’s also really hard to create a career out of art. I’ve always played piano and violin because I enjoy it and because I love making music but since coming here it seems like it’s all about perfection. And I think that’s a good way for it to be because if you’re going to make money off a music career, it should definitely be perfect. But maybe that’s not me. I just love music and I love playing.”

“What are you gonna do then?” Yuuji asked, admiration lacing his tone. “Drop out and experience the world and find inspiration like Chikara?”

“Not sure,” Keiji admitted. “I think I’m going to change my major and go for something else. There’s a lot of things I could do. Music can still be a passion and a really good hobby. I feel like I’d get too stressed to enjoy it if I was trying to rely on music for my career. I admire the people who can do that but maybe I’ll take up writing songs or get a job playing piano at a bar or something in my spare time.”

“Bro, I don’t know what it is exactly, but I can _so_ see you playing at a bar.” Kenji sounded awed. “And I promise that’s a compliment. You’re not shady or anything but that vibe fits you really well.”

“I’ll try not to let you down then.”

“Dude, you would never in a million years let us down! Why would you even think that!”

Keiji didn’t respond.

Chikara shifted to touch his arm. “Keiji? What’s wrong?”

“I have a professor who got really upset with me when I said I was thinking of changing my major,” Keiji admitted. “He’s always asking for perfect from me. So he got perfect out of me, or as close to perfect as I can play. He told me I could be something if I didn’t turn away from this opportunity. Petty as it is, I don’t want to give him the ‘I-told-you-so’ when I walk away and lose my shot at being someone.”

“You’re already someone,” Yuuji insisted loudly. “You always have been and you always will be! You need to follow your heart, Keiji! You have a passion for music and you don’t want to lose that by working too hard for it. Screw your professor; he just wants to be as talented as you but he’s not you so he can stick that in his juice box and suck it!”

Another round of soft laughter went up around the room.

“Thanks, guys,” Keiji said. He nudged Kenma. “Speaking of struggling to find passion, what’s going on with you, man? Don’t think I haven’t noticed how little time you spend on actual classwork in comparison with building games and stuff.”

“Leave me alone,” Kenma huffed. “I’m allowed to have a hobby too, y’know. Maybe I’ll do the same kind of thing as you and develop games in my spare time of being a software engineer. It’s not the most exciting job, but it would probably give me the time to do stuff like that on the side. Maybe I’ll get lucky and hit it big someday. But the gaming industry is hard to get into, kinda like music. You have to be the best of the best.”

“Is that all that’s holding you back?” Kenji asked. “Because that seems like a dumbass reason not to shoot for something you care about. Everyone is different. Maybe it’s better for Keiji to let his passion be a hobby but maybe for you, going for gold is what it’ll take to get you excited again.”

“Yeah, don’t think we haven’t noticed how lackluster you are about everything lately,” Shigeru teased.

“I’m not exactly a ray of sunshine normally,” Kenma shot back.

“What’s the worst that could happen if you try getting into game development?” Chikara asked. “You’re not good enough and you have to keep trying or work as a software engineer. What’s the best that could happen if you don’t try at all? You resign yourself to a boring job anyway. Why not go for it? See what happens? We’ll be here to catch you if you fall.”

“I... I guess so.”

“Dude, we’ve all seen you when you’re fired up about something,” Kenji interjected. “Maybe you don’t get physically hyped, but you get intense. And personally, I think that’s really cool and that’s what’s going to get you into the industry you want.”

I found myself smiling in the darkness. For only living together for two months, we all knew each other way too well.

Suddenly, I was being punched. Not an uncommon occurrence in this house, but still, it startled me.

“Fall asleep on us again, Kenjirou?” Yuuji snickered.

“What? No. I was thinking.”

Kenji scoffed. “Dangerous activity, thinking. Come on, we all opened up about what’s been eating us lately and now it’s your turn, sleeping beauty. What’s been keeping you up the past few nights?”

“It’s just school,” I said. “You guys know me. This shouldn’t exactly be shocking that I’d pull all-nighters to keep up. Between six classes, tutoring, and working, I stay pretty busy. This is just a stressful time of year when it tips the scale of being too much. Once midterms are over, it’ll go back to normal.”

“Right, and you’ll get five hours of sleep a night instead of none,” Kenma said with an audible eye roll. “Why can’t you be like every other freshman on campus, testing the waters before you get too involved with stuff you can’t keep up with? You make the rest of us look lazy as hell and also really good at taking care of ourselves.”

“People have high expectations for me,” I argued. “I’m not going to disappoint anyone back home and I’m going to take advantage of my time here. This is the time to get ahead in life.”

I thought it was a reasonable statement but Shigeru didn’t sound impressed. “Where the hell do you get your ideas? Because it sounds to me like genius costs $4.50 at Starbucks and we can all be just like you if we just give up sleeping and leaving the house.”

“Fuck off! You know that’s not what I think! I’m not trying to be better than anyone, I—”

“Kenjirou.” Keiji’s voice was soft but firm. “What he’s saying — and it’s something we all think — is that you don’t have to work and tutor and take so many classes and study all the time to be impressive. We know you’re smart and hardworking. There’s no need to overdo it to prove yourself. We get it. Like we said to Yuuji, the world can tell that you’re committed and intelligent by the way you act. There’s no need to act like you have something to prove.”

“You have a lot of expectations placed on you, you’re right,” Chikara said quietly. “And I have a feeling most of them are ones you’ve placed on yourself. But let us give you another one. We expect you to take care of yourself. We’re not going to mother you but we can’t help worrying about you sometimes.”

I exhaled slowly. “Okay. I’ll give myself a break.”

“No, you’re going to give yourself a lot of breaks,” Shigeru interjected. “You practically work full time on top of being a full-time student. You know what that adds up to? Too full. Pun intended.”

“Just... kick it down a notch,” Yuuji butted in over Shigeru’s bossy tone. “I’m sure you know your limits, but there’s no reason to test them every single day. That’s gotta be exhausting.”

“It is,” I admitted. “Not sure I’ll know what to do with myself if I give myself room to breathe.”

Yuuji laughed. “We’ll teach you how to have free time. By the end of the semester, you’ll be an expert on wasting time.”

“But there’s no test, so no need to study,” Kenma said sarcastically, bringing forth another round of laughter.

I smiled again and let my eyes fall shut. “Okay. Challenge accepted. I’ll learn how to be lazy. The pretest is seeing how long I can sleep. If one of you wakes me up, I’m going to be pissed that I failed.”

“We just gotta put everything in terms of schoolwork, then he’ll listen to us,” Chikara joked, but I was already starting to tune everyone else out as much-needed sleep took me as quickly as it had earlier in the day. The others seemed to move closer and after keeping myself alert for so long, it wasn’t hard to relax.


	7. The Fellowship of the Thing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written and directed by Ennoshita Chikara ;)

If I was reenacting this moment as a movie, everything would’ve frozen for a few tense seconds while the camera zoomed in slowly and the music intensified. My breathing was shallow as I stared at my computer screen and thought through what I had just done. Why hadn’t I thought this thoroughly before I can blicked the final button?

I didn’t know what to do so I stood up and raced out of my room, knocking on the door of another before entering. It was early but I knew Kenjirou would be awake, more out of habit than anything now that the semester was over, as of yesterday.

Sure enough, he was seated at his own desk but turned when I entered.

Tears poured from my eyes and I rushed forward. Kenjirou barely had time to stand up before I crashed into him, trying to be quiet for the sake of the others still asleep in rooms around us.

“7 am and your day is already in shambles,” Kenjirou muttered, hesitantly putting his arms around me. “What happened?”

“I need help,” I choked out.

Kenjirou didn’t sound like he knew what to say. “... Do you want me to get someone who’s better at this emotional stuff? Yuuji’s probably awake.”

“No, you’re blunt and logical and that’s what I need. Tell me I’m stupid to be afraid of something I shouldn’t be afraid of!”

“Okay. Stop being afraid of things you shouldn’t be afraid of. It’s stupid.”

I opened my eyes into the fabric of Kenjirou’s shirt. The tears had come hard and fast but they were surprisingly easy to stop as well. I held on tighter. “Help.”

I didn’t know how to explain myself so I pulled Kenjirou along with me back into my room and showed him my computer and the confirmation form for the plane ticket I’d just booked.

Kenjirou’s eyebrows quirked and he looked almost impressed. “That’s halfway across the world.”

I nodded. “Yep. It is. I haven’t bought a ticket back. I don’t know how long I’ll stay over there. The whole point is to have an adventure and play things by ear and see where life takes me and gather inspiration but I can’t help being terrified. I’ve never traveled on my own before and never without a concrete plan but I wanted to do it like this... I’m scared.”

“That’s okay. You’re doing it anyway.” Kenjirou shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal. “Doesn’t matter if you’re scared as long as it doesn’t hold you back from actually going. You know this is what you want to be doing and that’s why you’re doing it.”

“It was so impulsive though...” I stared at the screen. “I just. Did it.”

“No, you’ve been thinking about this for half the semester. Just because you finally manned-up enough to click the button doesn’t mean it was an impulse.”

The comment may have been intended as rude but I found myself smiling. “You’re right. I’ve put this off long enough and I’m glad I’m finally going.”

“Good. You should probably pack considering that flight is in just over 24 hours.”

Kenjirou started to leave, but I stopped him first. “You got it worked out with Yuuji, right? That he’s going to keep living here even though he’s not a student. I want to do the same. I don’t know when I’ll be back from this or what I’ll do then, but I can’t picture living somewhere without you guys.”

“That’s fine. As long as you keep paying rent, that room is all yours.”

I appreciated how simple things were with Kenjirou sometimes. He didn’t care that I was freaking out about leaving the country for an indefinite period of time, he didn’t care that I was dropping out of school to pursue some elusive inspiration, he just cared that I paid rent on time.

“I... Thanks. If anyone asks, I’m going to find an outdoor supply store to find a backpack. I want to do that thing where you only bring a few day’s worth of clothes and you play things totally by ear and let the adventure take you where it will.”

Kenjirou laughed.

I blushed, pretty sure. “What? It’s a thing! I’ve read travel blogs and people do it all the time! Maybe you—”

“No, that’s not it.” Kenjirou punched my arm. “I’m laughing because you’re shaking. I can’t tell if it’s because you’re excited or scared.”

I looked down. I didn’t know people could tremble so much outside of fiction, but there I was, hands practically vibrating. “Both,” I breathed. “I’m both. This isn’t my style. I’m not the outgoing type to drop everything and let adventure take me. What am I doing?”

“The right thing,” Kenjirou answered, taking a step back toward the door. “If you have time to wait a bit for everyone to get up, we’ll all go shopping with you if you want. Hopefully, with seven of us, we’ll make sure you don’t forget anything important. Either that or we’ll just get kicked out of the store but we’ll do our best not to.”

I nodded and Kenjirou left the room. I should start gathering what I had on hand. What clothes should I take? Was there any way to plan what to eat or where to stay? I knew I had the money for this adventure since I had been saving for another three and a half years of college and had only made it through a fraction of that. Should I back up the pictures on my phone first so I’d have more room for more? Should I take my laptop with me? It would be invariably helpful but it was another object to carry around and keep track of. What did I think I was doing? I was barely an adult and thinking I was just going to casually adventure across the world because I felt like it? I was alone and—

Well, not so much alone.

Breaking me straight out of my thoughts, my door was blasted open and Yuuji barreled in to crush me in a hug. “Chikara!!!” He screamed. If Kenjirou hadn’t already woken the others up, that would’ve done the trick. “You’re finally going adventuring! I’m so excited for you! But I’m going to miss you! I love you!” Yuuji kissed me without warning. It wasn’t the first time and I reminded myself it wasn’t going to be the last time either. I had a home here and a family with these guys, now all crowding into my room to join the hug. Not one of them looked like they questioned my choice one bit. A few even possibly looked jealous.

“I can’t believe our baby crow is finally leaving our nest,” Kenji said, his expression contorting into one of feigned sorrow. Now let’s get you to the store so you can g-t-f-o a little faster. I want your room while you’re gone. Yuuji doesn’t know how to sleep in even when there’s no class anymore.”

I felt like crying again from bittersweet happiness. Could I really leave this behind to travel for a bit? Yeah. Yeah, I could. I’d have more inspiration when I came back. And then I’d have the support from my friends to make something out of myself with or without school. And, not going to lie, it would be a nice break from the chaos of being crammed into a house with six other teenage boys.

Instead of making me say something, we loaded into our two cars and drove to the nearest outdoor outfitter’s store, a place I’d visited a few times just to look around, but it was very different coming with the intent to buy things for an adventure. Hah. Intent. Outdoor store. There were tents everywhere.

I nudged Yuuji beside me. “Hey go sit in that display tent and stick your head out.”

Yuuji obeyed without questioning, grinning up at me from inside the tent. “Why?”

I snapped a picture of him. “Because I’m going to get homesick so I have the in _tent_ to capture some memories first.”

Yuuji thought that was hilarious.

Kenjirou frowned. “There was a way to make that pun using better grammar and sentence structure, but whatever.”

I laughed to myself and ignored him. Shigeru pointed out some bikes posed in front of a rough-terrain backdrop. We climbed on and took a quick selfie, pretending to be serious. The photo looked good. If I posted it online, it might even fool someone into thinking we were adventurous. But I was adventurous. I had to keep reminding myself. I was going adventuring.

For a weekday morning, the store was fairly empty and we didn’t have to worry about bothering people with our raised voices as we roamed the aisles, picking up objects at random that we didn’t even know the purpose of.

Yuuji got everyone’s attention diverted onto possibly the fanciest lantern I’d ever laid eyes on, with more settings than one would ever need and Kenji tapped my arm. He motioned silently, a wicked grin stretching across his face.

While the others were still inspecting the lantern, Kenji and I crept away and threw ourselves into a display raft. Hunched down, we couldn’t see the others, but we heard them well enough as the others realized our disappearance and looked around for us. Kenjirou found us first and we pulled him into the raft as well, starting an impromptu game of sardines in the store. Hopefully, we wouldn’t be kicked out before I got all the supplies I really did need to buy.

It took another ten minutes for the rest of our group to find us, then we all sat in the raft for a bit, singing kumbaya which turned somehow into another Panic! At The Disco song (Kenji and Yuuji’s fault).

I almost had another breakdown in the clothing aisles when Keiji reminded me I probably needed to get some lightweight winter-wear if I was going to be spending time overseas with only minimal clothing in my possession. He and Kenma helped me pick some stuff out and add it to the small pile.

The backpacks were my favorite thing to look at. I’d stopped at this display before, but it was quite different now. To the others’ surprise, I picked one of the large bags off the rack and slung it over my shoulders. It was plenty big enough for anyone’s backpacking needs and it was enough for me. It wasn’t the biggest one on the shelf but it would help force me to travel light and it wouldn’t be too heavy for me to carry. “This one,” I said, and marched toward the front end with my purchases.

“Did you even look?” Kenji asked. “There’s a cooler-looking one over—”

“I looked, Kenji,” I said confidently. “You think this is the first time adventure has ever popped into my head? I’ve looked at backpacks before. I decided on this one and said ‘If I ever build up the guts to go backpacking around the world, this is the best one.’ And now it’s finally happening.”

“Seriously?” Shigeru whined. “You’ve been secretly planning this and never told any of us until this morning when you’d literally already booked the plane ticket for tomorrow?”

“Hey, I didn’t really know it was happening.” I couldn’t help smiling as I turned to punch him in the chest. “I can dream. You’ve fantasized enough about getting picked for a pro team but when it happens it’ll still be a surprise to the rest of us.”

Shigeru rolled his eyes, but he looked content enough with my explanation.

 

Fortunately, when only taking a backpack, there wasn’t a lot for me to pack. I spent most of the day choosing what not to bring with me until I finished fitting everything into my backpack that I’d need. It was still terrifying to think I’d be completely alone in another country with no working plan for food or accommodations, but I had everything I needed to play things by ear and take what opportunities were given to me.

The others barely left my room all afternoon and we talked pretty much the whole day, dreaming up scenarios of what I might encounter along my way (in varying degrees of plausibility).

Dinner was spent gathered close together on the couch, one of my favorite movies playing on the TV. Kenjirou called in sick to work for the first time all year, which made me feel pretty important, to be honest.

We didn’t stay up very late — my flight was in the morning and I wanted to be well-rested.

Apparently, after I had gone to bed, the others stood in the hall and argued about who would be taking me to the airport in the morning and I awoke to find that they had landed on the decision to cram all seven of us into a five-person car and we’d all go together. I liked that option much better than having to pick.

 

Insert cutscene.

 

As long as the drive to the airport was, it didn’t feel like more than a couple minutes at most.

We pulled in to the dropoff zone and none of us moved. I sat in the passenger seat, watching the other travelers outside my window, entering and dropping off their luggage. My backpack was in the trunk, waiting for me. Just go. I didn’t move.

“Y’know, I don’t know why you feel like you have to travel to get inspiration,” Kenji said from the back seat from around Kenma who was sitting on his lap, looking uncomfortable. “We’re a pretty inspiring group of people if I do say so myself. I don’t know what you’re going to see out there that’s any cooler than what we have right here.”

I smirked. “Oh, I’m well aware I’m never going to meet anyone quite as unique as you guys. And trust me, I’ve gathered a whole lot of ideas from living with my best friends. I have a feeling you’ll all show up in some form or another in my award-winning screenplays. I still need to see the world though. I have to know what’s out there. The mountains are calling and I must... skedaddle.”

Keiji reached over from the driver’s seat to touch my arm. “And you should see it. Let us know when you find some good inspiration and whenever you’re ready to come home and we’ll be ready for you.”

Outside, an attendant was blowing a whistle at us. We were taking too long.

“I’ll keep you guys in the loop,” I promised. “I’ve got some ideas I’m working with already. It’ll be interesting to see where it takes me.” I rested my hand on the door handle and pushed it open. “See ya.” My eyes watered a bit but I looked back and smiled at my friends before jumping out of the car, grabbing my backpack, and waving goodbye.

 

When I’d made it through security, I sat down by my gate to kill time until the flight. The others were texting me nonstop already, most asking if I was still alive. Yes, yes I was still alive. But it made me smile. I chatted with them and it felt a little bit like high school when we had that group chat made for the team captains... but obviously this was drastically different since we had become so much closer over the four months we’d been together.

It was almost sad to say goodbye again when it was announced we would be boarding soon. When I turned my phone off airplane mode again, I’d be in another country.

In my head, the image of the traveler I’d be was completely at ease, boarding the plane and sitting down in a window seat. I wanted to look so casual about this, pulling out my computer and getting things done, but I couldn’t make myself look away from the window and the clouds beneath the plane until over a half hour into the flight.

Only then did I get my laptop out of my carry-on for the duration of the six-hour flight. I was excited to see more of the world than I’d been exposed to before, but I hadn’t been lying when I said I’d gathered a good bit of inspiration just from daily life with the others. I didn’t know quite what to do with the idea I had yet, but I pulled up a blank document to start.

 

SEVEN STUPID TEENAGERS INHERIT THE UNIVERSE

 

FADE IN:

 

EXT. CROWDED HOUSE - SATURDAY EVENING

 

At home in a small college town, seven freshmen argue over silly, important things like pizza toppings while waiting for their futures and the delivery to arrive.

 

* * *

 

 

Guest lecture by Erica -- experienced college drop-out:

Alright kids, let’s talk about college AUs. And real college. If you were raised in a background anything like mine, college is the expectation and there’s even this lovely genre of fanfiction known as college AUs that depict your faves finding success along their school path. For some of you, that’s exactly what your future holds and I’m so proud of you and happy for you. But what fanfiction doesn’t show and what people don’t often talk about is the cases where that might not be your thing.

So this one is going out to those who don’t because that is what I know how to speak on because it is the reality I am currently in. I’m 19, I graduated high school in 2017 with straight A’s and several transferrable college credits from AP classes. I was enrolled in a state university as an interior design student. I attended classes for six days before I had a crisis and knew with absolute certainty that I didn’t want to do this. I changed all my classes to writing courses and convinced professors to let me in. And it was a great semester. I learned a lot and had so much fun. In my spare time, I started drafting my first novel. For someone like me who’d always enjoyed school, it was picturesque. Except that it wasn’t. It’s hard to learn an art form in a classroom and by the end of the semester, I had an almost-finished manuscript in my hands and the thought of staying put a rock in my stomach. I wanted to take a shot in the real world and see where I could get myself — and it’s the best decision I’ve ever made.

I moved back home. I’m indebted to my wonderful family a thousand times over for letting me come back and live somewhere where I feel safe and comfortable.

I’ve been earning my keep working full-time at a grocery store and when I’m not there, I’m writing, researching, editing, and improving my craft. In the last couple months since I moved home, I finished that manuscript, rewrote it all, wrote another manuscript, and began editing the first with the intent to start looking for agents to represent me in the publishing industry in the next few months.

(Side note: it probably sounds like I have everything under control but. Do not be fooled. I am a trained writer who’s very good at fiction. I’m taking things one day at a time and refusing to play the “what if I hadn’t dropped out” game. I’m not guaranteed any degree of success and I don't know what tomorrow holds. All I can do is my best, every single day.)

 

Therefore, I wrote this A) because college AUs are lit and B) to hopefully give a bit of a different perspective that doesn’t get represented as much — those students who find that college isn’t for them. If you’re a student right now, maybe you’re going through a similar thing and hopefully, I can reassure just one person with this. I projected a lot of my own experiences in all of the boys in this.

I gave Yuuji my stellar grades juxtaposed with the desire to drop out. The fear of looking like “a stupid dropout” is really real (esp in my family of ambitious, successful people ugh). The “College isn’t for me” sentiment is valid and it doesn’t mean you’re stupid. It’s okay if it’s not for you.

I gave Kenji the wake-up call I had in high school that I had to work harder if I wanted to get somewhere. The world expects your best, hardest work. There is no way to cheat that system.

I gave Kenma my awakening, the realization that I didn’t want to be an interior designer and I didn’t want to settle. Sometimes you need to pursue your passion. Nothing else will do.

I gave Keiji the right to let his hobby be a hobby. One of the smartest decisions I’ve made was to get a full-time job so I don’t have to worry about supporting myself with my half-baked craft. It’s tough and my mother is always reminding me that I essentially work two full-time jobs as I spend another 40+ hours a week writing but it’s worth it and it’s worth it not to have to stress out. With an artistic passion, it’s hard to hit it big. Don’t put that kind of monetary stress on yourself. (I also gave him That One Prof™ who _insisted_ I wasn’t going to get anywhere without an MFA. We’ll see, buddy. We’ll just see what I make of myself, won’t we.)

I gave Shigeru some of my worst nightmares: fears of not being good enough. These aren’t easily shaken and I won’t pretend I’ve gotten over it. But it’s a process and despite the fear, we, as artists, must persist.

I gave Chikara my probably unusual perspective of dropping out with the intent to become successful. Most commonly, you go to college in order to become successful, not the other way around. But it’s not necessarily the opposite. It’s hard to learn an art form in a classroom and sometimes it’s not the right environment. For some, yes. For others, maybe not. While I did learn a lot in college, I’ve learned far more from doing things on my own. Don’t let school hold you back if you want to try things out first, or travel, or gather inspiration from the world. Don’t let anyone tell you that the only place you can learn is in a classroom.

I gave Kenjirou my unfortunate overworking habit that I’m still currently struggling with. College or not, reaching your goals and fulfilling your dreams is going to take a lot of work. But you also need to let yourself live and possibly cut back on your expectations. Between my job and writing, I rarely watch TV, relax, hang out with people, or get enough sleep and I’m still trying to find the perfect balance between it all. I tend to do things like getting mad at myself if I read a book while eating lunch instead of writing while cramming a sandwich in my mouth which is definitely taking things overboard. Stay physically healthy, sleep plenty, hang out with friends, exercise, take care of yourself. Life can feel very rushed and urgent but you also need to like. Survive the night. Don’t deprive yourself of the world looking for what’s ahead.

I’ll say again, college is perfect for some people and some careers (if you want to be a doctor, I’m not talking to you. You need that degree, my friend. Please.) but for the small audience that this might apply to, I just want to state my perspective since it is a bit uncommon. It’s okay if college isn’t for you. You are going to do amazing things :)

By no means am I an expert on life or anything but I have this experience now so if you think you might be in a similar boat and you have questions or need encouragement or advice from a bona fide college dropout, hit me up. I’m [@you-can-all-eat-shit](http://you-can-all-eat-shit.tumblr.com) on Tumblr for fandom purposes.

I’ll also plug the writing blog I have, Vanilla Ventures, at [Tumblr](http://vanillaventures.tumblr.com/tagged/mystuff) and [WordPress](https://vanillaventures.wordpress.com) which is mostly for short prose doodles and bits of introspection and poetry but I’ll also probably post updates about my own writing when I have actual updates to share lol.

 

Thanks to everyone reading this! If you liked it, feel free to drop a comment!

 


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